iampat

ban

2012-02-08T23:56:00.002Z

i had planned on writing a coruscating and vitriolic piece lamenting the fragmentation of language and meaning. pontificating on how 'oppressed groups' were reclaiming words for their use or how the youth had co-opted certain words for slang and how this double divide of minority and generation made discussing certain topics such a linguistic maze as to be almost impenetrable.

then i thought fuck it that is just going to go wrong.

not that it mattered as another thing popped up that was equally playing on my mind.
boris.
yes boris tbe blonde blusterer.
i can't say i am all that keen on having ken livingstone back, but let's be fair it has to be anyone but boris.
what has begun to annoy me is how everything vaguely new for london is being prefaced by 'boris'. it worked ok with the 'boris bike' (which i believe was put into action by ken and came to fruition under boris), then there was the 'boris bus', the so-called new routemaster which has none of the charm of the original and really is just a slightly sleeker double-decker. regardless the boris prefix worked becase of the 'b'.

we have also had the boris island - the proposed thames estuary floating airport.

we are potentially going to be subjected to the 'boris pod'. quite why these olympic games information kiosks are credited to boris is unclear. surely they should be 'seb sheds'?

so i was going to propose a ban on attaching boris' name to anything other than boris himself. until i saw that yvette cooper, the shadow home secretary, had described the allocation of an additional £90 million to the metropolitan police, ostensibly to cover the cost of the olympics and the diamond jubilee, as a 'boris bung'.

yeah i like that: a boris bung.

cancel the boris ban, and remember to keep dropping the boris bung into conversations.

success

2012-02-07T23:51:00.003Z

"of course rewards for failure are unacceptable - and those who believe in the free market are the first to say so. but a strong, free market economy must be built on rewards for success."

so say george osborne.

to a large extent he is right - most people do not have a problem with high pay (except the daily newspapers who will go on about those in the public sector who get high pay - at which point all the arguments about paying the right money to get the best people for the job and rewarding success are thrown out the window), nor do most people have problems with bonuses.
it is when the high bonuses go to the high earners regardless of the success of the business. when really the bonus culture has become the expected large pay-out at the end of the year regardless of performance.

mr. osborne goes on to say that what is at stake isn't just the bonuses of the few but the jobs and prosperity of the many. ironic considering that in many of the companies that people get exercised about bonues amounts are the ones where they are cutting jobs (fewer staff, less costs so more profits).

interestingly the head of finance banking at ubs is not going to take his bonus as the company had lost over £1bn.
it isn't a case of congratulating the, already well paid, boss for refusing a bonus - it is a question of asking how someone in charge of a business that list £1bn is in line for a bonus to start with.

that, mr. osborne, is what annoys people. it isn't an anti-business movement, it is an anti-greed movement.

holes

2012-02-07T23:32:00.000Z

it is the little things that remind you that you are getting old.
today i was double-teamed, topped and tailed.

you go out. you get a coffee. you get a beigel.
the coffee is good. as ever.
an evening stroll down brick lane chewing on a beigel. mmmm that was a bit crusty. only that crunchy crusty bit wasn't an over baked beigel it was the broken shell of a tooth. nice. now my teeth are not the best in the world - they are the american stereotype of english teeth.
i am scared of dentists, well that is not true i am petrified of them. it is that simple. all i can put it down to is a fear of pain - it wasn't like my old dentist, mrs. gutzman, was bad it was just that it always hurt.
i have never gotten over the fear of the pain.
since my late teens i have managed to avoid dentists - until last year, and even then i had a panic attack and decided against getting treatment (the anti-biotics did the trick).
now i have half a tooth, but no pain. so for the moment no trip to the dentist is needed.
the fear is there.
another sign that i am getting old.

at the other end of my body, another hole was playing up. this time i had a bout of constipation.
the walk and the coffee had worked a bit of magic and there was a rumble in my tum. rush to the toilet have to catch the movement. luckily there was a book in the bog ready to read.
i take the throne like elvis in his pomp.
a little parp.
then nothing.
patience.
patience.
another parp.
then the first contraction and the bowling ball of poo pushes up against the much smaller hole of the sphincter muscle.
it shall not pass.
tears in the eyes.
shortness of breath.
pain.
relax.
squeeze.
contract.
that poo has to ccome out.
the anus doesn't want to let it out.
contraction.
squeeze.
little ball of shit plops out.
splash.
red mist in front of eyes.
small success.
squeeze and squeeze again.
it's coming. it's coming.
feck that hurts. it realy does hurt.
now that is has started nature and gravity take hold and out it comes.
a large long log of fecal matter.

felt like i was shitting sandpaper.

looks like my plumbing is going to pot (ahem).

time for me to crack out the shawl and slippers, old age is approaching.

60th

2012-02-06T18:57:00.000Z

hip hip hooray.
lizzie has been on the throne for 60 years.

my dad once told me a story (which means it was probably a bare faced lie) that when he was wooing my mum he took her for a walk along the mall. a romantic jaunt by one of london's nicest park heading towards buckingham palace. as they reached the queen victoria memorial a large state car drove by them and the queen waved at my mum and dad. what made it special for my dad was that it was just him and my mum on the road. obviously it must have made mum feel special as she went on marry the old man.

like many angst ridden and angry working class teens i had my long moment of being a republican. i have no idea what swung my opinion back to being a closet royalist (i suspect it was middle-aged during which conservatism (with a small 'c') kicks in. it might also have been a belief that certain institutions have a part to play in order to bring social cohesion.
doesn't really matter what it was these days i quite like the royal family.

the cost of the royal family is around £40 million a year (or 20 leaders of royal bank of scotland, or less than tevez), it is less than a £1 a year per person.

yet there is a way of making the royal family self-sufficient and clean up politics at once. no more pressure on politicians to award honours. this function gets given to the windsor firm (keeping ferie away from the cash box)and let them sell peerages.
at a stroke the royal family can be cash rich and no longer dependent on the state and the political class has one less thing to sully its name.

i have solved two problems with one fantastic idea.
it makes sense. you know it. i know it.
vote me for mayor of london.

(yeah it came as a surprise to me too, as i have thrown my hat into the london mayoral race.)

so lizzie, congratulations for making it to 60 years as queen.
a doff of the cap.
and a rousing round of hip hip hooray!hip hip hooray!

slush

2012-02-05T23:56:00.001Z

on the other hand i am not too keen on slush.
not even as slush puppies.
maybe as a slush fund.
plain ordinary slush - that you can keep.

snow

2012-02-04T23:56:00.002Z

i love the snow. i always have. i hope i always will.
i love it because it is special - it transforms the world around you into a (cliche alert) wonderland.
i love it because a couple of my fondess memories are to do with the snow.
the day adam and i spent in the snow throwing a rugby ball at each other, while making up terrible puns based on tracks from our favourite rock bands. it was a day where white covered the race course estate, and turned a dour housing estate magical. it was also the day when i had icicles in my beard.
or the late night on horsenden hill with dave and a sled. the whole hill to ourselve. virgin snow. cold crisp air. clear sky, bright stars. lots of laughs as we climnbed the hill and sledded down it. it was a time just before we had to start pretending we were adults, our last time when the only cares we had in the world were to do with exams and girls (and in dave's case his only problem was how to juggle them).

it is still snowing.
it is not heavy, it is constant. the snow making a nice crunch under your feet. it changes the sounds of everything - even the traffic sounds better. people have come out to play in it, laughing and excited - their inner child allowed to make snow angels.

i love snow, always have.
i hope i always will.

dm

2012-02-03T23:55:00.002Z

i love the daily mail. there i have said it.
i love liz jones. there i have said it.
if i could have the daily mail's babies i would - that is how much i love it.

i admit my love for the daily mail is odd and creepy and i should seek help, but i can't help myself.
where else can you see people get worked up by non-stories or see nothing be pumped up into something dire: the sky is falling because of eu directives or health and safety regulations.

from reading the daily mail middle-england seems to still be waging war against the boche and have yet to forgive vichy france.

sometimes it is hard to know what irks the readers of the daily mail most: health and saftey, human rights or the european union (eu).

today it is the eu.
the eu have a policy document called "developing the european dimension in sport", it was published mid-january.
the daily mail has a headline that goes like this:
"british sporting heroes 'should wear eu flag on their national team shirts'"

(now i have skimmed the policy document and i can't see anything that actually says anything like this, but i don't know what has been debated and agreed.)

as ever with the daily mail when you read the article it doesn't quite tally with the headline. but first here is a mock-up of what the daily mail thinks wayne rooney will look like in his eu approved england jersey.

the actual article does state that any such move would be purely voluntary, oh and that it be '..displayed on the clothing of athletes from member states, alongside with the national flags.'
not quite as the headline or the image would have you believe.
not quite forced to replace the national flag, more of if you want to you can have the eu flag in addition.

as if to prove what dastardly people the burghers of the eu can be the daily mail cites the recent case where the eu (the rotters) fined the university of northampton more than £56,000 for not displaying the eu flag(boo hiss - those petty minded paper pushers)even though the university had been in receipt of funding from the european regional development fund, and part of the conditions for the money was displaying the flag (but still did they have to enforce it... )

a non-story blown out of all proportion. fantastic. the usual daily mail.
it is why i love it so much.

what really makes the daily mail so very special (needs) is the contribution of its readers. here are a few of my favourites

fceu !!
- hunty, carnforth, ***** witty and succinct – unusual for the mail readership.

how about we have the eu flag branded to our foreheads? then everyone will know who owns us. the eu is like a cancer, always wanting more, never satisfied, seeking complete dominance in every sphere, spreading to every sector of our lives. please tell me, when was this war where we lost to the eu? did someone forget to send us the memo? as we are treated like a defeated people, cattle to be bought and sold. the truth is that our mps have sold us into slavery for 30 pieces of silver, generation after generation.
- dino fancellu, epsom, ***** the standard over the top, makes little sense response.

its one thing to take away our freedom to speak, but try and take my idenity and i will fight you all the way.
- anne mcguinnesss, middlesbrough ***** because our identity is always tied into what the footie team is doing.

i bought an eu flag on ebay for £5 and set fire to it on video and posted it on youtube......it was removed within 12 hours. they won't change my mind or my attitude though....
- mickey v, manchester uk (not eu), 3/2/2012 23:00
over our dead bodies, soon we will see direct action against these europhiles and their places of work
- rob, england, 3/2/2012 19:52 ***** planning a riot, which seems odd considering how the mail was so anti the rioters.
mickey and rob need to get together to plan their direct action – if they do it right they can make it a social protest and art performance at the same time. i can see a turner prize on the horizon for them, mind you being daily mail readers they probably don’t like modern art.

what a shame! i had been looking forward to watching the olympics too.
- gladys friday, london,
well i for will not be attending any england game if they have that disgusting flag on their shirts
- kazza , sunderland england, ***** two for the price of one – because we only watch these things because of the designs of their shirts (which would explain why rugby league has never taken off), and from what gladys is saying she is only there while the british team is there – so few finals being watched in her house (if she still bothers to watch).

bollocks

2012-02-01T22:54:00.000Z

ok i was going to do a sarky piece slagging off experts and tink tanks.
why might i want to do that i can hear you ask.
mostly because people like the taxpayer's alliance give them a bad name. add in those 'experts' who come out with research results that either tell you the blindingly obvious (eat too much and you will be fat) or the utterly pointless.
so when the chance comes to have a pop at one of them it is hard to resist.

the bbc have a story on their site about the 'predictations' of a independent research body. the piece implies that they want their cake and eat it.
aha i think - typical. they say one thing and then have loads of caveats to cover themselves with and then say that their first claim might not be right at all.

i go over to their website and see that isn't quite what they say.
i think aha i can change what i was going to write into 'this is how the press works' type thing (of course i normally expect this sort of thing from the daily mail - not the bbc).

i return to the bbc site to prepare my piece. only to discover that i had misread the story entirely wrong and based on a total misunderstanding.

fuck.
that's why i am not an expert working at a think tank.

bonus

2012-01-28T23:40:00.003Z

oh not more ranting about bonuses pat! haven't we heard enough.
well yes.
well no.
this isn't about the rbs bonus as such - though it is nice to see that sir philip hampton has forgone his £1.4 million of shares. sir philip is chairman of rbs and on the their renumeration committee.

no this mini rant has been sparked by a letter in the guardian from dave way of marks sattin recruitment.

mr. way is upset about the current wave of hostility towards the payment of bonuses. he goes on the describe the call for those in the financial services to give up their bonuses as 'a worrying sign'.
mr. way goes on to argue that to deny people the rewards for their work will drive talent out of the uk.

now when i was working my reward for good work was my continued employment, a hoped for pay rise and just maybe a bonus. the bonus was never guaranteed.

as a reminder this is the definition of bonus
1 an unsought or unexpected extra benefit.
2 a seasonal gratuity to employees beyond their normal pay.

in the world that mr. way inhabits it seems that getting £1.2 million a year salary for doing your job isn't reward enough, you also have to have a very large bonus. not a bonus of 10% or even 20%, nope your bonus has to be much larger than that say 75% or more percent.

i don't believe that people begrudge those in high powered jobs a fair reward, we might wonder what it is that they do to get their million pounds or more salaries but we understand that you have to pay to get the right people for the job.
in fact most of us agree with mr. way to the extent that people should be rewarded. where we part company is the expected high bonuses that seem now to be seen as entitlements.

what is interesting is the argument of paying good money and good bonuses appears to stop when it comes to regular employees.

meanwhile cameron and clegg have put a pay freeze on state employees, regardless of how good, or important, a job they do.

need i remind you that we are all in it together?
i didn't think so.

bonkers

2012-01-27T23:34:00.001Z

i am not normally one for celebrity gossip.
there are two reasons for this - most of the celebs that covered mean diddly squat to me and on the rare occasion when someone i like, admire or respect is in the news i generally skip over it because quite often the reason i like, admire and respect them has little to do with them as people.
i suppose i don't want my heroes tarnished.

but there are times when i can't help it and i cave in and read a bit of gossip.

i can only confess that my interest in demi moore is two-fold she is a bit of a hottie and she has a bruce willis connection.

the bbc are carrying a story about the 911 call that a friend of demi moore made when she collapsed after 'smoking something'.

in the uk at the moment there is leveson inquiry going on about the press invasion of privacy into the lives, mostly of, celebs (and if we are honest people didn't give a toss about it until the milly dowler revelations). their complaints stem around the amount of personal, and often private, information that the press prints.
can't say i blame them - just because you have made a tv series or have appeared in a movie i doesn't mean that the public have a right to know what the results of your last medical check-up were.

imagine what poor old demi must be going through.
not only does everyone know she has had to go to hospital but the public also get to hear the 911 call. why? what good does it do.

then i thought what a geat business idea.
a best of celebrity 911 calls - all your faves on one cd - tiger, mel, demi and many others.
it will be a christmas hit.
k-tel where are you when i need you.

bonus

2012-01-26T23:51:00.002Z

if i am honest i have no problems with stephen hester, chief of the royal bank of scotland (rbs), getting his close on £1 million pound bonus. the bonus is going to be paid in shares, so at least that gives him a bit of an incentive to do well by rbs, though you might of thought his £1.2 million a year salary would have done the trick.

the reason i don't have a problem with it is that we knew these bonuses were coming and we knew nothing was going to stop them.
the coalition might have made noises about how they were going to change this bonus culture and bring restraint - all their action seems to be little more than asking that businesses explain why they have given the bonus, give more power to the remuneraton committees to veto bonuses and pay and more transparency.
pretty much confirming that the condems talk the talk but their bark is bigger than their bite.

so let's look at why mr. hester will get his bonus. oh it is the usual if they didn't give it to him they feared he would resign and maybe some of the other board members might do to.
oh dear?
i'd call their bluff. tell them they are free to go.
ask yourself this: how many £1.2 million jobs are there? how many of them are looking for someone? then ask this: how many people are in £900,000 jobs who are looking to step up? or my old favourite - get someone from a cheaper country (if it works for all those other jobs - it will work for these jobs).
but the bluff isn't going to get called so we will never know.
(this isn't the frist time rbs have 'revolted' over bonuses, maybe it is a tactic they have learnt from the unions).

how about the remuneration committee? the chair of rbs' committee is sir philip hampton, he is also the chairman of rbs and is involved in the united kingdom financial investment ltd, which was set up to oversee the government's stake in the banks it had subsidised.
no conflict of interest there. at all.
sir philip on taking the role at rbs, famously said that his senior people were not worth the money they were getting paid. it seems he has changed his mind.

i can well imagine how hard it must have been for sir philip to come to the decision to pay the bonus.
sir phil: 'stevie we've a bit of a problem with your bonus'.
steve: 'really?' (concerned look on his face).
sir phil: (long pause, big smile) 'gotcha' (big laughs) ' you should have seen your face.'

in the end until the government grows a pair the subsidised banks will always use the threat of resignation in order to push through their bonuses. so there you have the 'reason' for the bonus (call it the best man for the job gambit).
when it comes to the remuneration committees because this is very much an old boys network people from one committee might be making decisions on people who might make judgements on them so it unlikely that they are going to be too stringent in case it comes back to bite them when it is their turn (call it the you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours strategy).

transparency means very little. we know they are getting their bonuses, we know they are getting their salaries. they could publish even more detail - but in the end all the information in the world means nothing if you can't actually do anything with it to bring about change.

the royal bank of scotland has shown it isn't going to change.
the united kingdom financial investment ltd hasn't changed it.
the con/dems seem unwilling to change it.

words are cheap, which is lucky as the bonuses are quite rich.

rubber

2012-01-25T23:51:00.002Z

i like a bit of porn. i make no !ahem! bones about it. the reason i mention this is that is that the los angeles porn industry is being hit with a new law that means that male performers will have to wear condoms.
for many this is a victory for health and safety for those involved in the industry, anything that cuts down on the transmission of aids or other sexually transmitted diseases is a good thing. right?

not so. a few have complained. ron jeremy, a porn legend, says that it will remove the element of fantasy for the viewers. others say that some performers prefer not to cover up. while some say that it will be the end of the porn industry as no one will buy condon based porn and they will just turn to imported porn. of course as this is only, for the time being, going to be the law in los angeles it is likely that porn companies will just move to other parts of the usa - after all it is not like they need large studios to shoot the latest instalment of 'anal carnage' or 'facial wipe off'.

the porn industry says the fact that all its performers have to be tested for disease every thirty days is a sufficient safeguard.

(if you are squeamish skip this next paragraph - old bloke talking about having sex. you have been warned).
scroll down to where you see there @@@@@@@@@@@@ for normal service.

back in the day when i was sexually active (and by active i mean a once a week shag with the ex) condoms were always involved. i was happy to 'suit up', as it were, which suited the ex, she didn't like using the pill. there were a couple of occasions when the reliance on condoms caught me short and unlike baden-powell i was not prepared which meant a lot of hanky panky at night and a serious case of blue balls in the morning.
just to spice things up we even got a variety pack of condoms - while it seemed like a good idea at the time, it turned out to be a disaster: the ones that weren't uncomfortable just made us laugh.
only once did we have a moment of condom failure and that was more to do with dilly dallying after the event. it lead to a couple of worrisome weeks. all was well.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
(old bloke has stopped talking about his sex life).

i suppose the point i am trying to make with my little journey down memory lane is that using a condom in sex is hardly the buzz kill that the los angeles porn industry is trying to make it out to be.
contrary to ron jeremy's argument i don't think that seeing a bloke with a condom in a movie is going to take away from the 'fantasy' of it - that comes from the fact that the porn stars are all sexual acrobats who can fuck in positions that only trained yogi can get into, that they move effortlessly from one position to another in a ballet of porn. add to that they go on for longer and recover quicker than the rest of us can dream of and i thnk you have the fantasy part of it just there. a bit of rubber isn't going to change that.

however what a bit of rubber might do is send an important message out to all those who are sexually active that it isn't wrong to wear a condom. that wearing a rubber doesn't make you any less of a stud.

if that message is picked up on then the law passed in los angeles may just do more to cut down on stds/aids than all the guff that government and ngo educational programmes produce.

for that reason alone i say more rubber porn.

predictions

2012-01-24T23:40:00.000Z

i don't consult my daily horroscope.
i am wary of what the met office tells us.
i take bus and train timetables with a pinch of salt.
i don't trust bookies with their odds.

when it comes to predictions the experts are no better than making a choice based of the roll of a dice or the flip of a coin.

the international monetary fund (imf) has downgraded its global growth forecase from 4% to 3.25%. the coalition government do not see this as a worry as it jibes with what their, sorry the independent, office of budget responsibility (obr) has to say about growth.
the obr like the imf have changed, several times their short and medium term forecasts.

the imf, who if memory serves me once praised the coalition's austerity programme, are calling for, some, governments not to cut so deep or so quickly.

changing the tune seems to be the order of the economic day.

we are expected to care what ratings agencies like standard and poors or moodys say even though they happily gave triple a ratings to institutions who were dealing in toxic debt.

if i didn't know better i would say it is like economists have minds like goldfish.

here is my idea next time the imf (or any global financial institution) wants to announce their revised figures we'll wheel out bruce forsth to go 'higher? lower?'

the mayans have more chance of bein right than the international monetary fund.

perhaps imf stands for intellectually mendacious forecasts?

gove

2012-01-23T23:32:00.002Z

i may have mentioned this before but i don't like michael gove. i really don't. i was a little shocked to discover that i have a book by him, as yet unread.

the government is doing that 'let's get down with the kids' thing and are trying to use social media to spice up politics.
they have asked twitter users to submit questions that can be put to michael gove when he faces a forthcoming select committee.
graham stuart mp says, "this is a good way of breaking down the seemingly vast gap between the governed and the governing,".
he might be right, though it could also be argued that if members of parliament did their jobs properly and spent time in their constituencies then there wouldn't be a vast gap.

it has been successful with a poitive response to the request. however it must be said that this is a pretty self-selecting group of people - people who are already interested and are following politics on twitter to start with.
the gap between the governing and those who are not interested or already involved it seems will remain the same.

in the end it doesn't really matter what the response is the questions that will actually be asked will be chosen by the committee staff and the mps sitting on it.
it would have been better if the questions were just chosen at random and see what mr. gove made of them.

because of this i have not bothered to send in my question which was: "dear mr. gove have you modelled yourself on the demonic ventriloquist dummy, fats, from the movie magic."

to be honest the only thing that could make mr. gove any more scary would be to discover that he is a secret mime.

cap

2012-01-22T23:20:00.002Z

there is a part of me that believes that iain duncan smith is trying to do the right thing.
there is also a part of me that agrees with the broad concept of a benefit cap.

and yet despite that and despite iain duncan smith's claims to the contrary i can't help but feel that the cap is just a way to punish those who are unfortunate enough to be unemployed.

he talks about how people are 'trapped' by benefits - he says there are people in parts of London paying more than £100,000 a year in rent "which no-one on a regular income could possibly afford".
i would take a guess here and say that the numbers who are 'trapped' this way are very few and that to use this as an example is lazy.
(without facts it is hard to know what the circumstances of these 'people' are - does he mean rent or does he mean mortgage repayments? if it is about mortgages then it is quite possible that the people involved could afford to live this way before they moved on to benefits. if it is rent it is highly doubtful that anyone was paying that sort of rent when they were working and that the rent they are now paying is more down to the greed of the landlord than the inhabitants).

while it isn't to be considered a punishment the argument's core is this - on benefits you don't want to work, in order to get you to work we will cut your benefits.
if that isn't a stick (punishment) i am not sure what is.

of course while all this benefit capping is taking place there is still no concept of where the jobs are going to come from. so does the person who can no longer afford to live in their home thanks to the caps - move somewhere else? to a part of the country where the rents are cheaper? where it is quite likely that there are no jobs?
maybe it is just a plan to ghetto the unemployed outside of the thriving cities - out of sight out of mind?

the idea of rent control seems not to be one that the coalition is going to consider and why should they - after all if someone is making money from the misery of the poor that is a sign that capitalism is working.

it has been argued that the savings of this cap is not that much (in over all terms) and that we are paying out more in benefits to the very wealthy than are going to be saved by this cap.
if this is the case - then it makes sense to means test the rich, again something that won't happen - make the poor jump through hoops to get something meanwhile let people like vince cable keep his heating allowance.

as i say i am not against a cap in principle - but i am against something that appears to have the sole purpose of punishing those worse off.
that said it is the tory way after all.

why

2012-01-21T23:53:00.002Z

newt gingrich. why?
looking like he is going to become the next republican candidate for the presidency.
the one positive of that is that it should mean that barack obama will get a second term. the downside of that is that barack obama will get a second term - hey the man doesn't like the english, i can return the favour.

oddly both are good outcomes for the british government - now we can move away from the 'special relationship', especially where it relates to anything to do with the military. we can stop being a nuclear power - think of the money that would save and that could be used elsewhere.
the empire has gone.
time to move on.
let the usa's new friends back them up when they want to go off and play the world's policeman. we don't get any thanks when we do it and we can't afford it.

so whoever becomes the president - now might be the time to stop being so keen to sup at the usa's table.

lazy

2012-01-20T23:29:00.004Z

it is nice of boris to tell us that londoners are lazy and worhshy.
perhaps he should be doing more to show londoners where the jobs are? maybe he should be making sure that the jobs have a living wage to them?

oh well at least it means ken has something else to fight boris on rather than the london transport fares.

why

2012-01-18T13:04:00.000Z

you may have noticed that i am a bit of a sap when it comes to apple products - i just want their computers, laptops and ipads.
i love them.
i can't afford them, but i love them.

there i was having a coffee and a couple were out together but on their interconnectedness devices of choice.
she had an ipad, with external keyboard and mouse.
why?
why?
just get yourself a sodding laptop if you are going to want to be tippy tapping on a keyboard.

(also have you noticed that there is an ipad/anypad/kindle reading position - it isn't comfortable or natural but it lets eveveryone around you know you have one).

inflation

2012-01-18T12:59:00.000Z

i am broke. that means cutting down on the luxuries.
i am an addicted: i need fizzy syrupy drinks. i am hooked on coca-cola (which probably isn't a selling point for them).
but needs must and i have downgraded in order to keep the habit going.

now i am down to buying a 2 litre bottle of sainsbury's basic cola "simple natural colours and flavours, still plenty of pop" goes the description.
i am the equivalent of the local drunk in the park with a large bottle of rotgut cider.

still it is cheap and it does a job.
it was 18p a bottle (that gives you an idea of the quality)in the middle of last year. it is now 25p a bottle.
gougers.
preying on the needy and the hooked.

ho hum it looks like i may have to move onto tesco's basic cola at 20p a bottle.

the downward spiral.

olympics

2012-01-16T23:51:00.002Z

i never wanted the olympics in london.
why? i can hear you asking. the simple reason is i believe all major global sporting events should be played in different time zones so you have to make an effort to watch them.
it was only when it became london against paris that i changed my mind.
of course i have reason to dislike the whole thing as it cost me my job and the buggers never employed me. (what me bitter)?

anyway that was then.
this is now.
just over 190 days until the games start.
from what i can make out they have got pretty much all the stadia built on time. which alone deserves a big round of applause, but in this day and age that isn't what we want to do, what we want to do is find some reason to bitch and moan.

the stories that have popped up recently about the london oylmpics have included the problem with traffic. this may be a big problem with the 'olympic route' being designed to ferry olympic officials from plush central london hotels to the games in the east end of london (quite why the organisers have to stay in the centre of london is anyone's guess; the answer is probably to do with being smug self-important bastards).
one of the problems of the route is that they are not going to test it out until very close to the opening ceremony so it won't give drivers much time to get used to it.
i would say catch the 25 bus to the games but thanks to boris there is less capacity on them. still there is a nice tube station right on the doorstep of the games and a couple more within walking distance.

the two stories that i have chuckled over today have been the one about pollution. apparently london's pollution is the worst in europe and that will have an adverse effect on the athletes.
some of them may not have the performances they expect and this, they can now claim, will be down to the pollution.
i wouldn't mind if no other sport ever took place in london - it is not like there are several professional football, rugby and cricket teams in the capital. it is not like there are athletic meets taking place throughout the capital. let's forget that the london marathon takes place, or for that matter the triathlon events.
it must be that they are expecting olympic sized special weather.
given that weather forecasters are about as accurate and economic forecasters perhaps we will take their concerns with a pinch of salt.

not to be outdone there is a report that mass gathering risks disease spreading. not only that but there are problems when it comes to dealing and controlling large numbers of people. this is news how?
common sense really.
it also seems a bit redundant bringing this up now. it is not as if this is the first large scale global sporting event ever to happen nor is it the first large scale gathering of people.
crikey we have even had such large scale events in london, if you can believe that!

whatever your opinion on the olympics is the games are almost upon us why not just enjoy them for what they are, at least for now.
remember we still have 190 days, or so, for bob crow to spoil them with talks of strikes and such like.

i'm even prepared to forgive boris, in advance, for mugging it up and taking credit for the whole thing.
i think that is mighty generous of me.

dementia

2012-01-15T23:51:00.000Z

one of the controversies over the 'the iron lady' was the portrayal of thatcher's dementia. i have no idea if it was an accurate picture of dementia, i do know that i did find myself feeling somewhat sorry for the old dear and i never thought i would say that.

jonathan aitken has revealed (because like all good tories he keeps secrets) that at a dinner party mrs thatcher did not know that david cameron was the prime minister. for aitken this is an example of how bad her dementia is.

personally i think she is just embarrassed by the preening toff and prefers to ignore him.

overheard

2012-01-14T23:40:00.000Z

two pretty ladies chatting to each other. they had both been talking about why they were not going out on a saturday evening and that lead them on to a discussion about friends and men. one of them mentioned she had recently made a new male friend. it was nothing sexual but they got on well with each other, lots to talk about. he was witty and intelligent. he was also older than she was. this all led up to this quote:
"he's 55. i can take him anywhere."

it made me smile.

prices

2012-01-12T23:15:00.002Z

"we want to keep prices as low as possible for our customers. household budgets are stretched, and we are doing everything we can to help our customers keep their bills down.." so said ian peters of british gas.

and they have indeed reduced their electricity prices by 5%, effective immediately.
however don't forget that they increased prices in august by 16%, not to mention that gas prices also rose by 18% in the same month.
so even with today's cut british gas are still ahead of the game.

other suppliers are reducing the prices of both electricity and gas.
british gas say that they are not dropping the price of gas because the long term trend of the wholesale price of gas is upward. other suppliers don't seem to agree to this and say that the future wholesale price is cheaper now than it was so as they buy so far in advance they will be lowering the costs.

the costs are coming down (but probably not below the price rises of last year) when the worst of the winter has passed. just how amazing is that?

and here is a bet i will make with you right here and right now. the price of gas and electricity will rise this year sometime in august or september to take immediate effect - not in a couple of months (as is happening with some of the price drops) in order to get the prices in place for the winter.
don't ask me how i know.

any takers?

congratulations

2012-01-11T23:28:00.002Z

take a bow 'the evening standard'. london's free evening paper has been running a campaign and gathering a fund to help what it calls 'the dispossessed'.
the reason why it is shouting about it on it's front page is that it is about to hand out £1.25 million in grants to grass-root charities fighting inequality. so far the paper has raised and doled out something like £3 million. pretty impressive.

also pretty depressing when you (just to take an example)that this is football's january transfer window and that some players will be bought and sold for much more than that - and several of them will see their wages top that amount.

david cameron likes it because 'the dispossessed campaign has stirred london's conscience and will have a big impact in helping people to climb their way out of poverty.'
for cameron it jibes with his 'big society' no state people are doing it for themselves malarkey.

boris johnson says of it 'i am grateful to the eveing standard for again highlighting the poverty and deprivation that shame this city while giving every londoner the chance to help remedy the situation.'

it is almost like they can't do anything - except both of them can. for instance they could both campaign for a living wage, obviously they won't because that will upset their mates in business who will complain 'we can't afford that...after all we have had to put up director's pay by 49% without any appreciable improvement in our businesses'. (do you remember the old adage 'pay peanuts and you get monkey's' what should be the eqivalent? 'pay the best get the least worst'. answers on a postcard please).

in boris' case it is even more sanctimonious as he has just presided over a transport fare hike that hits the lowest paid worst. (ken livingstone has already made the fares as the main plank of his mayoral campaign - but he could also add in simplifying the zones and charges - is there really a need for as many zones as there are and various prices that go with them? he could also add in targeted help for the poorest).

a doff of the cap to 'the evening standard'.
a big rasberry to cameron and johnson.

doomed

2012-01-10T23:57:00.000Z

according to the times george osborne, the chancellor, is going to take over the planning to ensure that scotland remains part of the united kingdom.
oh well.

goodbye scotland.

madness

2012-01-08T23:35:00.002Z

there is a level of madness within the capitalist system. it is part of its nature. it is this madness that socialists hate. what is even madder is the business media.

a sunday evening in my favourite coffee shop, a cup of joe and the sunday times.
a report that tesco's is abot to announce its worst christmas in decades.
really? no shit.

before we forget let's just remember that we are in the midst of a financial crisis. unemployment is rising. the cost of living is rising. so what does that mean?
well even i can see that means there is less money to go around. less money means less stuff being bought. simple really, unless of course you happen to be a financial journalist in which case the lack of spending seems to be a mystery and any decline in spending is seen as a major surprise.

tesco's market share has dropped from 29.3% ro 28.9% in the uk.
tesco's worldwide made a record profit of £3.8 billion last year and looks set to overtake that this year.
overall tesco isn't in a poor state. yet still the analysts carp.

why do they carp? because they feel tesco may not be to expand in the uk much more. no shit. i have three tesco metro stores within a 5 minute walk of where i live, so the only way they expand around here is to start having a display in people's houses.

clive black an analyst of share capital says "we expect tesco to be the industry laggard". i am not a betting man but i reckon tesco will still be top dog.

(interestingly while looking for some information for this blog i came across a piece in the guardian, so hardly secret, that reports that tesco had just reported its 4th quarter of declining sales so the current story of the worst christmas seems even more of a non-story).

want

2012-01-07T23:48:00.002Z

nikon have annonced their new top of the range camera the d4 is soon to be released.
i want one.
the chances of me ever owning one are on a par with my chances of become mayor of london (mmm hold on i just need to beat boris and ken - all i need to do is promise to keep fares down and ... darn what else).

still it might mean the other high end camera's in nikon's range drop down to more realistic prices.

look nikon - i love your stuff (even more than i love apple's stuff)so feel free to send me a d4 to play with. just look at my photos i need all the help i can get.

pay

2012-01-06T23:56:00.002Z

david cameron seems to have taken on board some of the concerns of the average person in the street at the escalating scale of wage rises that those at the top get and how, often, it is not related to success.

he is promising to clamp down on it.
i suspect that it is no more than empty words.

this time next year we will all still be complaining that the heads of large corporations are still trousering more money than they can spend while their staff have to make do with no pay rises at all (because well the economic situation is still bad).

however let's hope that this is one promise david cameron makes good on.
not holding my breath mind you.

2012-01-05T23:46:00.003Z

it is as hard to get worked up about dianne abbott’s, labour mp for hackney, ‘white people’ comment as it was to get outraged by aiden burley, tory mp, being in the same room as some friends giving a nazi salute.
regardless of the circumstances – abbot trying to have a nuanced discussion on twitter, burley at a stag do – what both show is that being an mp isn’t a guarantee of common sense or political sense, and that people are likely to do stupid things and in today’s 24-hour constant coverage of everything that anyone remotely known does being instantly newsworthy both become something larger than they are.
we’ll dismiss burley – if only because david cameron took swift action removing him as a parliamentary private secretary and ordering a fuller investigation.
ed miliband, leader of the labour party (in case you had forgotten) very swiftly ordered abbott to apologise. which she did claiming it was taken out of context, though quite how you expect context in 140 characters is something of a mystery to me. (as an aside has ‘out of context’ replaced ‘doing research’ as the get out of jail card of choice?)
the problem with diane abbott’s tweet is her anti-racist stance. her somewhat sweeping generalisation may point to an underlying dislike she has for white people – in general of course as i am sure some of her best friends are … well you get the picture. or it may just highlight how difficult it is to discuss certain topics without falling into verbal traps, after all would there have been a problem if she had said ‘ruling class’ or even ‘british ruling class’ (after all that is who she really meant). perhaps the episode goes to show that on twitter you shouldn’t try for complex ideas.
of course the twitterstorm that followed threw up lots of interesting viewpoints and highlighted that while twitter is useful and fun – it is still not a great gauge of right or wrong, the citizen journalist is often just as wrong or as biased as the media they often decry.
should dianne abbott lose her job? no. does it undermine her when she speaks about racism? just a little bit.

winter

2012-01-04T23:29:00.002Z

winter has been very mild, well at least in my part of london.
i am not complaining - with no heating not having to shiver for days on end under several duvets is a small blessing.
yet i miss a real winter.
so tonight i have enjoyed the sounds of rain lashing at my windows. the howl of the wind. the angry rustle of the trees.
bliss.

winter sounds so much better than any other season.

siege

2012-01-03T23:56:00.002Z

today was the anniversary of the siege of sidney street.
latvian anarchists taking potshots at churchill, causing the army to come to my street partly to deal with the anarchists and also to deal with the three hundred thousand or so people who came along to watch.

peter the painter (london's most famous latvian - not that there is a long list of famous latvians) has a tower block named after him. this caused a few people to wonder what on earth the council were doing. we'll know they have gone off their trollies when we have a 'ripper rise'.

LONDON - SIDNEY STREET SIEGE

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and

(SYDNEY STREET SIEGE) (aka SIDNEY STREET SIEGE)

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both from the wonderful british pathe site.

fares

2012-01-02T23:53:00.002Z

the annual tradition of public transport fares rising has come to pass. funny i remember how we were told that public transport being in the hands of private companies would bring in more competition and the usual combination of efficency and lower prices. oh we wish.
for some the prices rises are as high as 11%
for some the tube has become a luxury, leaving the bus as the only method of transport to get to work.

don't worry though david cameron has told us that he 'gets it' that it is hard and that many of us are worrying about finding work and paying the bills. he 'gets it'.
he gets it to the extent that he knows that some schools are not working hard enough to educate their charges, he understands that some hospitals are not clean enough, he understands that the police are not catching enough criminals.
don't worry he 'gets it'.

that is why there will be cuts in services.

see it all adds up.
sort of.

quote

2012-01-01T23:28:00.001Z

welcome

2012-01-01T13:48:00.000Z

welcome to 2012.
it can only be better than 2011. can't it?
it has to be better than 2011. it can't be worse, can it?

anyway make of it what you will, i am sure the mayans were wrong though i will need to check david icke on that - he must be hopeful as he has a new book out. that's a good sign whichever way you look it it.

paaaaarty

2011-12-31T23:18:00.000Z

to my fearless readers - hope you are all getting ready to party the old year out and the new year in.

enjoy. have fun.

review

2011-12-31T23:17:00.000Z

i thought i might do a review of my year.
then it struck me it has been a pretty shit year so why depress myself any more with it.
will be pleased to see the back of it.
looking forward to seeing what 2012 has to offer, fingers crossed it will be better.

celebs

2011-12-31T23:13:00.000Z

i am not much for celebrity. they never seem to deserve the adulaion, fame and fortune that they.
however i am not a heartless person and even i can see that as the year comes to an end there is a crisis in celebland. they are all becoming single. partnerships are breaking down. it is terrible to behold. first sinead, now russell and katy, then catherine and gethin.
tears have been shed.
so i have come up with celebcatch - a new agenecy that will make sure that celebs who have become single can find solace in with willing members of the public.
each pairing would be for a short period of time.
the celebs buying each time slot to fit in with their publicity needs. got a movie coming out? well here is a new romance for people to read about. need to promote the new cd? well why not a kiss and tell story in the papers from your last relationship (this would be agreed by the celeb and would be part of the contract).
it is perfect - they can have fun. they get to meet their fans. they get lots of publicity. there is no heartbreak.

i plan on floating celebcatch as an internet brand early next year.
no doubt max clifford will want to get involved.

don't think it will be as big a hit as oldblokewatch - but i am still waiting on channel 5 to get back to me on that one.

whine

2011-12-30T22:46:00.000Z

there i was in my local coffee shop (street coffee in brick lane - just to give it a plug) reading 'the sun', i know i shouldn't do it but every now and then doesn't hurt. one of the small 'news' pieces was of shoppers who were moaning that the shelves in shops were empty - that sales items had been sold before they had gotten to them.
oh my heart bleeds.
we all like a bargain.
but a little like bonuses there is no gaurantee that you are going to get what you want (unless you happen to work in the financial services for a company that has had to be bailed out by the government - then you can pretty much be certain you are getting lots of wonga). surely that is part of the fun of the sales going somewhere and hoping that they have something you want at a price that you are prepared to pay for it.
and if they don't: oh well.

the piece reminded me of one of the retailers i used to deal with.
for the sake of modesty we'll call him 'h': he dealt mainly in sports cards. this was a time when we did an ok trade in sports cards, but the vagaries of business meant that we would sometimes be left with too much stock. periodically we would take this extra stock and put it on sale.
a list of sale items would go out.
retailers would get back to us and place their orders.
if we were lucky we got rid of everything, without losing too much money on it all.
we didn't like doing it, but we liked having dead stock stinking up the place even less.

naturally a few retailers would not get what they wanted because someone had beaten them to it.
a day came when h decided that enough was enough - he wasn't getting enough of the cards he wanted at the price he was prepared to pay for them.
brrrriiing brrrriiing went the phone.
i picked it up and there was h on the other end of the phone. we did a few pleasantries (probably fewer from me)and then he got on with the nub of his complaints. sinmply put we were not putting enough sports cards on sale.
but h, i said to him, we are putting on sale what we have left that hasn't sold, that is all we have to put on sale.
he thought about this for a little bit, not long to be fair, and replied: then you should order more.

i couldn't fault his logic.
i could fault his business sense.
in order for him to have what he wanted - we had to lose money.

he was never very successful.

apple

2011-12-30T21:48:00.000Z

i can't deny i like apple products. i want their computers - desktops and laptops. i want their ipad. if i were to get a smart phone it would be an iphone.
i want apple.
i may have mentioned this several times before on my blog.
it hasn't gotten me an endorsement or a freebie from apple. i guess that is because i am not as famous as some of their high profile users. nor am i as photogenic or cute worthy as their current celebrity users.

yup it seems that even apes need to be involved in social networks. orangutans may soon be having video chats with each between zoos. apparently orangutans like looking at each other - i can already see scope for internet sites such as 'red hot chimp' 'm(onkey)ilf' and 'apestation'.

expect apple to roll out an ipad advertising campaign with pandas holding their ipads and using their 'pandas on heat' apps.

why

2011-12-30T13:35:00.000Z

i know i am not the most cultured of people.
i know that my taste bar is quite low (hell i think i am the only person i know who doesn't get enraged at george lucas for not only making 'the phantom menace' but daring to go and 'improve' star wars).
but even i have to wonder why on earth 'fast five' is the most downloaded film of 2012.
why?
it isn't that good. it is not like it was packed with great stars doing new work - vin and paul walk (oh i kill me sometimes) through their roles (pretty much like they did in 'fast and furious'. even the rock, sorry dwayne johnson fails to add much to it.
in fact the only good things about it come at the easter egg ending.

there are a lot of people who say that downloading is killing music and movies.
obviously it hasn't worked here as there is going to be a fast and furious 6 - just what the world wanted, and needed.

oh who am i kidding i'll be seeing it.

becks

2011-12-28T23:41:00.000Z

i like david beckham.
he's a working class kid who as made the most of his talents, and has worked hard at improving himself. he doesn't seem to moan about adversity he just gets on with it.
he seems to be a nice chap.
i like that he is patriotic and would do anything to play for his country.

now i can add another string to my beckman man-love: he has pissed off the french. the french socialists are pretty upset at what david might get paid a week if he join paris st. germain.
so raise a glass and host a toast to david beckham.
ah we few, we happy few...

app

2011-12-28T23:23:00.001Z

i suppose it was only a matter of time before someone presented me a serious reason why i wouldn't really want an ipad.
today is the closest i have come to giving up on my desire to own an ipad and be like all the other cool kiddies.
why?
because david cameron is a devotee of the ipad.
yes mr. cameron is a fan of apple.
at this moment in time a programmer in whitehall is working on mr. cameron's very own app so that by using his ipad he can see real time details of government figures while having real time news being aggregated on his screen.
lucky man.
it now means that while he is watching 'desperate housewives' (he is apparently a fan) he can see at a glance just how are waiting to go into hospital because of financial stress related disorders but can't get a bed because the hospital is making ends meet by 'selling' half its beds to fee paying patients.

david cameron is the killer app.

numbers

2011-12-28T23:22:00.002Z

here are some numbers for you.
unemployment is set to rech 2.85 million in 2012.
on average 23 people apply for each job that is advertised. john salt, director of totaljobs, see the signs as being pretty grim.

remember when this deficit malarky kicked in and the key aspect of the public sector cuts was that the private sector would step up and employ people. well it seems that between july and september of this year 67,000 public sector jobs have gone.
in the same time 5,000 new private sector jobs have been created.
well i can see a bit of a problem there.

so we have people being made redundant.
we don't have new jobs being created and we have too many people applying for the same jobs.

while we are at it let's throw in another set of figures. according to recent government research 1 in 3 of those claiming benefits have some sort of criminal conviction. this, as we know, means they are even more employable (just a hint of sarcasm there).
chris graying, employment minister (and what a job he is doing - talk about fiddles and fire)says it 'paints an alarming picture' - yes it does - he goes on to say this is why britain needs a 'rehabilitation revolution' (no i hadn't heard this one before, but it is part of the con/dem strategy, perhaps an offshoot of the compassionate conservatism they keep talking about). mr grayling goes on to mention that an element of this is getting the old lags back into work and a new programme for this will be announced in the new year.

and to quote nick clegg, it will make all the difference.

so that is problem families having to have one member of them in work in order to get an intervention.
that is youth unemployment getting a kick up the arse to get those 18-25 year olds into work.
add in the ex-offenders who need help and encouragement to find work.
that is three programmes that are, in theory, all trying to do the best for the people they are designed for and all with the express purpose of getting people back in to work. all of them very noble projects.
except for one thing.
and here the, to misquote led zep, question remains the same.
so mr. graying.
so mr. osborne.
so mr. clegg.
so mr. cameron.
so mr. duncan-smith.
the question is this: where are the jobs?
you see for me knowing where all the jobs are and where they are coming from makes all the difference.

it makes all the difference to me, to the youth who are unemployed, to the problem family you are saying can only have help if one of them is working, it makes all the difference to ex-offender who wants to work but his record prevents him from finding a job.
the answer will make a difference to all those on disability that you are now saying are fit to work. a difference to all those you say are not entitled to benefits.

that is the question we want to know the answer to: where are all the jobs.

so what is the answer?

thanks

2011-12-28T23:21:00.002Z

i want to give thanks to nick clegg - he has sent out a video message to his liberal democrat troops.
he bangs on about making all the difference (while making it sound like some dodgy catch phrase that will be used throughout the next year).
he tells us how the next year "..will be one that poses many great challenges for everyone in britain, but i know we must continue to do what's right for our country."

i want to thank nick for reminding me that 2012 will pose a great many challenges to many of us - such as finding work or making sure we are able to pay the bills. neither of which are going to be much of a problem for nick clegg and those ministers in the con/dem government.
nick is very wealthy - so he isn't going to be worrying about having to make a choice about heating or food.
nick is very connected - so when he stops being the deputy prime minister he isn't going to be losing sleep wondering where his next job is.

nick's biggest challenge is make sure he keeps his feet under the table of power and it doesn't look like the rest of the liberals in government are rushing to give up their places at the table - i reckon it is beause being there makes all the difference (to them).

these days i am not even sure that people like nick clegg actually understand what the challenges are for the rest of us.
even worse i am not even sure he cares.

ooops

2011-12-27T23:53:00.000Z

just as the year comes to an end some of the key reforms of the con/dems get a bit of bad press.

the raising of the personal tax allowance was seen as one of the more positive moves of the chancellor's budget. oh dear it seems that any gains from that are going to be wiped out by cuts in thing such as tax credits (those thing that help the poor go to work).
all in all the reforms turn out to be very regrssive - something that the tories like: the poor paying more, the rich getting more.

meanwhile over in the health reforms (remember that call to stop centralised top down change? well it hasn't happened yet) they are now talking about hospitals being able to earn up to 49% of their income from fee paying private patients.
now that is what i call choice for some.
i guess for the poor that just means either facing a much longer waiting list or travelling a distance to a less popular hospital in order to find a bed.

the true meaning of choice for the tories is that the rich get to choose the rest of us get the scraps.

if i were a cynical person i would say they had planned it to be like this.

sinead

2011-12-27T21:49:00.000Z

another celebrity marriage crashes and burns.
sinead stayed married for 16 days.

so to all those lovely female celebs out there - my schedule looks to be pretty free for the next couple of weeks. i am available, and i won't be upset when you decide that the time is right to ditch me.

open for offers.

hunting

2011-12-27T21:24:00.000Z

now i have to admit that hunting isn't that important to me. it isn't something that you do in the inner city (unless you count hunting the elusive job opportunity). it also seems an odd thing for politicians to get worked up about at the moment, there are other more pressing issues to deal with.

however it is curious that as the boxing day hunts take place - even though there is a legal ban in place - several conservatives are keen to announce that the ban should be over turned because it is unworkable.

is it unworkable because they haven't actually gone out of their way to prosecute the participants?

during august we heard a lot about the primacy of the rule of law. rioters had the book, and its supplement, thrown at them. those who were caught and prosecuted got sentences much stiffer than their offences would normally be given.
an example was being made.

so here is my suggestion. next time there is a hunt. have the police go down there in force (maybe even with water cannons) arrest each and every one of the toffs on horseback, bung them in the clink, throw the book at them and have them do time with the rioters.

let's see those posh law breakers be treated just as harshly. they can be made examples of too.

cold

2011-12-27T21:10:00.002Z

it has been a mild winter.
i have man-flu.
i don't like it.

forward

2011-12-26T19:09:00.000Z

now is about the time when all the quality papers start talking about all the good things that are going to be happening in 2012. it is also the time when you start hoping that you can start making the changes that will improve prospects in 2012.

so imagine my despair when i see that 2012 is going to start off with a celebrity big brother.
what have we done to deserve this?
really haven't we suffered enough?

hospital

2011-12-26T19:00:00.000Z

so prince phillip is in for another night.
his stent operation has been reported as being successful, yet he is still there.
i tell you what one man will do to avoid spending christmas iwth the middletons.
can't say as i blame him.

solutions

2011-12-25T23:19:00.000Z

you may have noticed that the country is in a bit of a pickle at the moment.
well pretty much the whole of europe is in a jam.
oh may as well admit that it is the whole of western capitalism that is up shit creek.

you may have noticed that there are many great minds who think up solutions to this crisis.
most of the ones we get to hear about from, say, the confederation of british industry and other like them, or the conservative party's big brains can be summed up thus:
cut taxes and cut red tape.
simple.

the usa has low tax - it isn't do all that hot at the moment.

as for red tape instead of cutting it you can see the con/dems are about to add to it for some industries as they try to combat the commercialisation and sexualisation of children.
because there are times when you just have to have rules (and explanations and examples of those rules) in place.
because there are times when the public have to be protect from the worst excesses of business.

really when it comes down to it perhaps the constant drone of lower taxes and less red tape should be confronted by questions of what bureaucracy they would like to see cut (mostly it would be to do with workers rights and protections) and what should be cut when taxes are reduced (and it won't be the charitable status of private schools).
sadly people like the cbi and taxpayer's alliance are rarely challenged in that way.

maybe next time?

concept

2011-12-25T09:35:00.000Z

some of you might be aware that i am a fan of babestation (ah the lovely jada - who doesn't seem to be gracing the screens of babestation these days). so i have been thinking of a new channel that would provide a similiar sort of service.

picture it, if you will, a set that features an big old well used armchair - the sort that you just sink into for the night and never move from until that moment when you drag yourself to bed.
next to the armchair is a light and a side table with a plate for some food and a cup or glass, depending on taste.
in the armchair sits a bloke in vest, pants and socks. they can be clean or stained. he sits looking at the camera, a come hither look on his face, a phone to hand. he might pick his nose enticingly or fetchingly scratch his bollocks.
he is waiting for that call.
a call that could be about football, about how much booze you had the night before, fishing, the state of the economy, how badly your car is running or how hard it is to get a plumber or even how hot the local barmaid is.
anything and everything is up for a chinwag.

he is every man and he can talk to you.
nothing will shock him - you say you think nick clegg is doing a good job and he will agree, that michael winner was a good director and he will nod knowingly, that you think richard littlejohn just edges clarkson in the quality of the writer and he will smile appreciatively.

he will not judge. he will not condemn.
he will be your best pal.

any tv producers out there? you know that this makes sense. in today's increasingly niche market that has tv gold all over it.

c'mon it is a winner.

wishes

2011-12-25T09:22:00.001Z

merry christmas to you all.
i hope santa has brought you all that you wanted and all that you deserved.
have a peaceful and relaxing day.
may your god go with you.

enough

2011-12-23T23:59:00.002Z

would it be churlish of me to say that enough is enough and that we all need a break from steve jobs?
i know he was a guru of design and technology; that he knew what we wanted before we did and blah de fucking blah.
but c'mon let's give it a rest.
let's see if we can go a couple of days without having to see his face or hear about him.

(while on the subject of not having to hear about people just because they are who they are i am tempted to start a campaign fo a stephen fry free day. one day of the year where stephen fry can't be mentioned or featured anywhere in the media or the internet. i know i am fighting a losing cause, but it is a windmill worth tilting at).

overheard

2011-12-23T23:56:00.000Z

there i am sitting in my favourite coffee shop (where else). i was enjoying the coffee and reading the papers. it was a quiet evening, very few people about (all off doing last minute shopping no doubt).
a mix of old classic pop rock songs playing.
then the, rather gorgeous, barista (coffee maker to you and me) declared to one of her customers: "i have honey on my ass".

now i am not fond of honey, but i was tempted to ask for a taste.

present

2011-12-23T14:36:00.000Z

santa has dropped by to give me an early christmas present.
i now have a dirty throat burning head thumping nose running wet cough cold.
just what i always wanted.

divine

2011-12-22T00:05:00.000Z

knowledge

2011-12-22T00:04:00.001Z

2011-12-21T09:28:00.000Z

this was sent to me by a pal.
it is cheesey tacky fun involving two of my favourite pop culture items.
sit back and enjoy.

quote

2011-12-19T21:37:00.000Z

peter hitchen is a bit on the unhinged side, which probably explains why his coloumn appears in the daily mail.
every now and then though there is a golden nugget.

"the french, who have never forgiven us either for trafalgar or for not surrendering in 1940.."
is from a piece about cameron's recent refusal to say yes at an eu summit.

the summit threw up another good quote from terry smith, chief executive of tullett prebon and fundsmith.
"but if we are isolated, we might be as isolated as somebody who refused to join the titanic just before it sailed."

both made me smile. not sure what that says about me or the eu crisis.

secrets

2011-12-19T20:43:00.000Z

in these days where anything seems to be in the national, or public, interests it seems impossible to keep secrets. what with citizen journalists joining the paps and hacks, while friends kiss and tell at the sight of a chequebook.
even so some things should just be kept secret.
not just to protect the people involved.
not just to protect the innocent.
but to prevent people thinking about the secret.

i was never a fan of the krankies. in fact i am still amazed that they are still going and still getting work (and good on them for that). they are not in my list of people to think about. ever.
however now that they have revealed that back in the 70s & 80s they were swingers and happy to have a 'ding dong' with other people. my mind is now agog.

they are appearing in panto in glasgow. is john barrowman thanking his lucky stars or is he quaking with fear?

well at least we know the answer to this question:

how

2011-12-18T23:57:00.003Z

i am not the most fashionable person in the world.
the only time i have been in fashion was back when i was wearing nappies, they were all the rage for all babies my age.

today i was reminded of two fashions that have persisted when really they should have been allowed to die.
like most blokes i have committed bad taste hair decisions. yes for a short period of time i sported a neo mullet. i am not proud of that fact but there you go.
while waiting in a queue i noticed that a young lad had a rat tail hair cut. why? it looks awful. it looks tacky. why are his parents letting him out like that?

then there is my perennial pet peeve: the low slung jeans. you either get a dollop of arse crack or you have to try not to laugh as the unfortunate fashion victim waddles down the road looking for the life of him that he is doing an impression of charlie chaplin having to walk home after he has shat his pants. not a pretty sight.

how have these two fashions survived.
why have they survived.

could we see the end of them in 2012?
i hope so.

why

2011-12-18T23:56:00.000Z

i know times are tough.
i know we all like a bargain.
but why oh why do people have to crowd around the cheap food shelves in sainsbury's in order to discuss the choices on offer.
firstly it is not like there is ever a wide range of choice.
secondly it is not like they have drastically reduced the prices.
thirdly it is not as if dropping price of an item suddenly makes it taste better, or different. if you didn't like cottage pie when you went into sainsbury's it is unlikely that 50p off the price suddenly make it taste like cauliflower cheese.

but no - all you get is disccussion, conversation, debate about if i get this i can add it to that and it will be a nice meal. or maybe if i get that cheap stuff that i don't like i might just discover i like it.

it doesn't work like that.
go to the shelf. look. see what they have that you like. buy it and move away. if there is nothing there that you like then just move on.

society

2011-12-18T23:47:00.000Z

thatcher famously said that there was no such thing as society. seems today's politicans can't get enough of it.
david cameron has his 'big society'. unfortunately not many people are sure what exactly the 'big society' is.
if david has one, then it seems that nick clegg has to have one. nick is about to give a chat about his 'open society'. it will, no doubt, be as spurious as the 'big society' yet it will be described in a way as to make it seem more radical than the 'big society' just to show there is a difference between the liberals and the conservatives.

well i have another society concept for them.
'theirs/ours'.
like all good concepts it is simple to explain.
'theirs' refers to the world that nick and david live in - one of comfortable privilege while 'ours' is the grim reality of life that they have consigned the rest of us to.

see simple. easy to understand. more importantly accurate.

short

2011-12-16T23:58:00.002Z

bit of a hoo-hah going on over a panto.
the panto is 'snow white' and the panto's producers, qdos (a name i hate just because it may as well be one of those nonsense names so loved by car manufacturers), have decided to cast children in the roles of the dwarves.
why?
they say it is because they didn't want to be thought of as exploiting dwarves.
this has kicked off a kerfuffle. warwick davis has said he can't see how 'short actors' could be exploited if they have choosen to play the roles. it would be just like any other job he says. (mmm short actors? not dwarves, maybe qdos are onto something here).
one of warwick davis' colleagues describes it as 'political correctness gone mad'.

there is a serious issue here of under-represented people being allowed to pay themselves in various forms of the media. even to the extent of just having them as extras in the background. in many cases seeing these 'hidden' people on the tv, stage and movies might go some way to removing them from being objects of fun.

however now that i have made my half-arsed serious point i can't avoid mentioning the comments of two members of the restricted growth association (rga - its short name, one says "i have dwarfism and i don't necessarily agree with dwarves going into show business thinking that is all they can do."
isn't it more likely that short people go into show business for the same reasons that the rest of us do? they either have a talent they want to share or show off; or they want the fame and fortune that they think show business is a short cut to? i could be wrong. i probably am.

the second comment is:
"providing they are not being ridiculed as people, i do not mind members of the short community playing comedy roles."
they don't mind them doing comedy.
they don't mind.
well that is mighty big of them.

and on that frankie boyle note i am going to get my coat.

2011-12-16T23:49:00.000Z

i have not been a big fan of youtube. recently i have been sent some links that have made me change my mind.
this young lady is one of the reasons i have decided that perhaps there is a purpose to youtube.

on a more serious note - i think this is the way to engage with the english reticence of learning a new language. who cares about how many corners your hat has (as i was once taught in german) we need more about sister fisting....

bye

2011-12-15T23:31:00.002Z

been a week for saying good-bye.

the bendy bus went on its last london journey, its route taking it to the great garage in the sky.
so boris can mark that as an election promise he carried out.
just means that londoners now have less capacity on the routes that used to be served by the bendy buses.
which is a little ironic when you consider that even with the forthcoming (annual) price increase for many the bus is the only form of transport thay they can afford to use in order to get to work.
still not to worry boris has made sure that the well off who come into west end in order to spend money in shops and to go to the theatre and restruants will not have to pay a evening parking charge.
it's all swings and roundabouts.

also have to say bye to jonny wilkinson, he has decided that it is time to hang up his international boots so he can enjoy a few years of fun rugby.
i have always liked wilkinson as a player. he is one of those sportsmen that epitomises all that is good about sport.
it also helps that he scored the winning points against australia in australia to win the rugby world cup.
his career has been blighted by injuries yet he still soldiered on and gave his all.
jonny i salute you.

he will be missed by more people than miss the bendy bus, but the loss of the bendy bus will have a bigger impact on the way they live thier lives.

hold

2011-12-15T23:30:00.001Z

2.64

2011-12-14T23:52:00.002Z

unemployment is up to 2.64 million.
it is a number that is an underestimate of the total number who are out of work.

a recent report from manpower has said prospects for work in the coming year are dire as most employers are waiting to see what happens with the euro and the ongoing financial crisis.

add in the regular attack on the unemployed by the tories. and it is not a good time to be unemployed.

perhaps iain duncan smith et al will look to those figures and that report as they condemn the unemployed for being feckless wasters and use this as an excuse to punish them.

to be honest i am not expecting them to change their tune, only increase the number of times that they sing the same old song.

shuffle

2011-12-14T23:51:00.005Z

those lucky few who have worked with me can testify to the fact that i am not a tidy person. i am the chaos master.
stuff, piles, heaps, mounds, spread, scattered.
i am a hoarder (that is when a collector goes wild, no longer constrained by the wanting of certain things, but when he can no longer get rid of anything - because it might be useful sometime; honest).

i decided i was going to alter the placing of various things in the flat: a change is as good as a rest, as they say.
move the tv over there, swing the desk around, change the bookcases.
something between a minor and major undertaking.
i measure stuff up: will it fit?
i plan.
i cogitate.
i go for it.
ah such schemes - wren and hawksmoor would have been proud.
shame that it hasn't worked out quite the way it should.

not helped by the fact that any such move seems to expand the amount of stuff i have. it all used to fit (just) now it doesn't.
how?
i don't know.

so i still have a little bit more to do.
who knows i may even be recycling; donating to the charity shop and just plain throwing out.

who knows maybe like the forth bridge the clearing of my flat approaches completion. it will happen - just not for a while yet.

greed

2011-12-14T23:51:00.004Z

tis the season to be merry, good will to all men and all that.
it is also the season of avarice. no doubt we will shortly be having all the banker bonus stories, after all there are a lot of journalists out there who want to remind us that they are not the worst people in the world.

before get to that we have to play out what is now becoming part of the annual london panto season: the boxing day tube strike.
it is hard to criticise workers or unions working to protect and benefit their workers. it is even harder to feel any sympathy for any worker on london transport who says they need to come out on strike.

aslef (associated society of locomotive engineers and firemen)are calling their members out on a boxing day strike (with three more walkouts in the new year).
why are they striking? because they want work to be voluntary on boxing day and they want anyone who chooses to work on that day to be 'incentivised' - basically trple pay and a day off in lieu.
the temptation is to say good on them for sticking up for the rights of the worker and for getting better conditions of work for them. the union is on about 'adequate compensation' for working on such an 'unsocialble day'.
except, it appears, they have already made an arrangement for bank holidays (and let's be honest here boxing day, for most, is just another bank holiday)which sees tube drivers earning over £44k, well above the national average, (it is due to rise to £50k over the coming years), work a 35-hour week and get 43 days holiday a year. all in all a pretty sweet deal.
the timing of the strike announcement is little more than cynical blackmail. (though i am sure there has been a lot of negotiations going on in the background, this is still rank oppurtunism).

bob crowe's rmt (rail, maritime and transport workers)will more than likely support the action by not crossing the picket line. (as an aside there is a poll on the rmt's website asking if george osborne's austerity measures will help the uk economy - currently is showing 63% of respondents say yes they will).

so it is looking like there will be no tubes in london on boxing day. unless of course transport for london (tfL) capitulates.

it also throws into doubt the rather nice deal that tfl has done with the transport workers for the olympics. if i were a betting man i would lay good money down that around april or may we will see mark whelan or bob crowe ask for a better deal for their members.

the funny thing about it is that there will be little to no sympathy for them if they strike and it plays straight into the hands of boris johnson who can claim he will be tough on the transport unions in order to keep london running. expect to see more stories about driverless tube trains in the coming months.

naturally if i get back into the workforce i want a union like aslef or rmt looking after me.

on the plus side there are a range of bankers out there who are thanking santa claus for the gift of a group of londoners who will be even more hated than they are.
take a bow you tube drivers.

proud

2011-12-13T02:23:00.000Z

must be great to be a liberal democrat right about now.
principles checked at the door, cozy inside and feet under the table.
what is there to complain about?

just saying.

disappearing

2011-12-12T23:51:00.008Z

the hunt for alien life goes on.
recent discovery of kepler-22b, an earth like planet has given rise to hopes of discovering life out there.

london has recently been 'attacked' by space invaders courtsey of the french graffiti artist, invader. he is famous for doing mosaics based on the old computer game 'space invaders'.
graffiti (or street art, urban art) has become big business over the last few years with works going for silly money considering that the pieces are not unique and can (and will) be reproduced in a slightly different form somewhere else.
hey if you have the money to buy something that someone else will be something very similiar too then go ahead. (oh ok i would if i had the dosh as well).

it seems that lots of people are aware of this as several of the new pieces that invader has put up on the walls of london have er disappeared. or more accurately have been stolen.

perhaps it is the sign of the times - art crimes go street.

maybe the chaps at seti can help find the missing space invaders?

want

2011-12-12T23:51:00.007Z

it has been put on the market and i want it.
yes admiralty arch is up for sale. just need a cool £75 million pounds and it is mine.
not saying i want to be there so that i can moon the royal family as they drive home for the evening. not saying that i want to be there so that i can flash whenever the bbc are covering a state event. nope none of those things.
it is just an impressive building and it would be fantastic to live there.
(actually what would be more impressive would be having the money spare in order to be able to buy it. ah such small dreams i have).

photo is copyright me and can be seen on my flickr stream to the right of the screen or here

mia

2011-12-09T23:07:00.005Z

i am sure there was supposed to be something interesting here - but i managed to forget what it was i was going to write. ooops.

greetings

2011-12-09T23:07:00.004Z

there i was having a coffee. nothing unusual there - i like having a coffee.
not many people in the coffee shop.
a loud voiced woman was telling her equally arty friend about a movie she was going to be working on next year.
two girls who just wanted to use the toilet - one of them with very sexy glasses and a cat in the hat t-shirt.
two blokes talking about sport.
a middle-aged bloke doing the crossword.
and me.

the arty people were joined by a couple of other women.
thus ensued much hugging and kissing of each cheek.

i hate that.
i am just not wired that way.
i don't want to hug. i don't want to air kiss.
i might shake hands. in some cases i might even go for a manly bear hug (a quantum leap from the fey hug of metrosexual crowd).
i may even, though not often, engage in a chest bump (sad to say it always looks lame, but at least raises a smile).

it might be that i am not friendly - can't argue there.
it might be that i am not tactile - very true.
it is quite possible that i am an english stereotype of stand offishness - and long will it remain so.

it could be that i am reserved, cold and shallow.
so sue me.

moan

2011-12-08T23:37:00.005Z

up front i am admitting that this is a very petty moan.
but petty is my middle name.

i saw this report on the bbc website about the british library putting online its newspaper archive. wow! i thought (no really just like that: wow).
i go over to the site. i am all excited. almost aquiver.

the first thing i notice is the bold headline telling me "search the archive for free" (the free being in a different typeface and capitals).
ooops i should have realised.
this is free in the sense that amazon is free to search.
this is free in the sense that some photography magazines will boast about the free catalogue you are getting with that issue.

yes it is free to search. so you can see that there was an illustrated police news during february 1867 - but you can't see what was in it.
you can even search by key words to see what the manchester evening news had to say about karl marx back in 1873 or you might note that the bath chronicle had an interview with mr. marx in august 1871.

what you can't do is view the search that you have found.
to do that you have to subscribe.
so it is not free in the actual sense of the word that most people use.
the site's welcoming headline is true and accurate but still just a tad misleading.

it is all further compounded when on investigation to the subscriptions (£80 12-month unlimited subscription) you discover the other mangled word of the internet vocabulary: unlimited.
unlimited is such a simple word. it means without limit. see simple.
not in the world of the internet. in the world of the internet unlimited always comes with its twin 'fair use policy' - which bascially means it isn't really unlimited. so why call it unlimited, oh for the same reason they call it free.
because they can.

as i say it is a very petty moan on my part.
one day i will have a subscription to the site as i am sure that interview with karl marx rocks.

austerity

2011-12-08T23:37:00.004Z

big dave c (david cameron to the rest of you) is quick to tell us all that we need to balance the books, that deficit reduction should start at home.
his sidekick, george osborne, is always ready to tell us that we are in it together.

nice then to see that david and samantha have reportedly spent £64,000 doing up their downing street pad. £30,000 from the taxpayer, the rest from the camerons.
what they spend of their own money isn't an issue - they have it they may as well use it. it does seem a bit rich though that someone who is preaching that everyone else should tighten their belts has managed to dip into the public coffer in order to do a bit of diy around the house.

it is all about priorities - if david has a nice place to come and relax in then it is better for the rest of us. it is money well spent.
unlike the money that used to be spent by the government in order to help its people. that was just wasted.

overheard

2011-12-07T23:15:00.000Z

there i was sitting at the computer listening to the radio (the really rather good tony livesey on 5live)there a short piece based on a survey that seems to be showing that people are less willing to support state backed benefits.
in that usual bbc way they had a balanced debate by having someone who was from the left and someone from the right. so the same old arguments were run out.

the leftie said that there should be more state backed house building - that would mean cheaper rent and more houses available. building new houses means employing new people in oder to build them.
the rightie was less keen on this idea as he couldn't see the point of the state creating 'mcjobs'.

so a right wing commentator who gets invited to give his opinion on national radio sees house building as being a 'mcjob'.
have to hope he gets filed under 'nutter' and he isn't called on again.

windy

2011-12-07T22:56:00.000Z

it is going to be very windy tomorrow (thursday), it is going to be what they call a 'red day' (which is the highest weather threat warning).

i just want to remind people that any wind felt in the south will be natural and nothing to do with what i have eaten tonight.
however the brand of coffee i am currently drinking in the morning has led to me producing some small gusts to gales of my own.

so i will be contributing to the winds - but the majority of them will be natural.

want

2011-12-07T21:14:00.003Z

'tis the season to be greedy.
icann (internet corporation for assigned names and mumbers)has released the .xxx domain name.
i want one.

there has been a lot of debate (oh you know you want me to do it and in this context it would be criminal of me not to)about whether or not a designated porn domain was necessary or desirable.

as part of this mass debate (see i didn't let you down)there has been some complaints and questions about the pricing policy for the .xxx domain name.
manwin, who run the playboy sites, say that the prices for the .xxx are ten times the price of .com and .org sites. a spokesman for the domain registry names said the prices are fine and that it is all about economies of scale as there are millions of .com and .org sites.
i would love him to explain how economies of scale work in this digital world.
he could have been countered by the fact that the .com .org market is a mature one, while the .xxx one is a growth industry that is about to have a large spurt of activity.

(in the trade that is called the money shot.
i thank you).

data

2011-12-05T23:43:00.005Z

the previous conservative government sold off the nationalised industries - that we are now all paying through the noses to use. the promise of better services, more competition and cheaper costs seeming to be like dust on the wind.

the current conservative government has moved into the digital social media era and is going to be flogging off our data to the highest bidder (or perhaps just giving it away to any old big pharma company).
the arguments used for it are laudable - more information means better research means better drugs.
but it is my information - i want more than cameron's word that my information is safe, i want more than cameron's word that if i opt out my information isn't going to be used.
i also want to know that if the state and the national health service is providing this kind of information to the pharma companies then they see something back in return for it - not just in the speed that drugs and treatments are created but in terms of the costs of those drugs and treatments.
we are told that the cost of these things are high because of the research that goes in to them - so with the data being provided research costs come down therefore drug and treatment costs should come down.

however as we have seen with energy and transport costs - the market only works when the companies want it to.

still

2011-12-05T23:43:00.004Z

poorly. but getting better.
thanks for asking.

poorly

2011-12-04T23:23:00.005Z

for various reasons i feel shit.
sickly rumbly tummy.
a low nagging headache.

pity me.

digital

2011-12-04T23:23:00.004Z

the big change over is coming.
soon all tv will be digital. if you are not ready you will miss out on your favourite programmes.

do i care?
not really.
why?
well for a start i don't really watch that much tv.
also i have a set top box which means i am ready for digital. oh yes baby.

so it is a sunday and one of the few programmes i want to watch is on. impact wrestling from tna. it is on challenge. i turn the tv on, i head over to challenge and i get nothing. the signal is weak.
what?
why? have they used the substitute transmitter? have challenge not put enough money in the meter?
so i do the sensible thing. i retune.
hold on i have gone from 88 stations down to 57 (ah mr. springsteen how right you were), no bbc but there is challenge that is all i care about right now.
still nothing. just a text box at the bottom of the screen telling me that the signal is weak. yet itv and their lame x-factor show was coming in loud and proud.
how does that happen.
it's digital - surely it is all coming from the same place and at the same strength.
i retune.
still nothing.
i fiddle with the signal booster. i move it here, i move it there. high. low. at an angle. more to the left. over to the right.
nothing.
nothing.
nothing.

fucking digital - waste of time.

buzzkill

2011-12-03T23:59:00.003Z

in norwich the people are stirring. there is anger in the streets.
why?
because there is talk of a topless barbers. yes partial nudity with your short back and sides. the horror. one of the local bars has hit upon the idea of when it is closed during the day to have some barber chairs and topless barbers. product and brand diversification and in these hard austere times businesses have to look for ever opportunity they can.

as yet they have not said if it is going to be just female hairdressers, male barbers or a mix (personally i would go for the mix - as you want to cater to all possible client bases - over a certain age).

naturally a whole bunch of people have gotten up in arms about it. there is even a facebook page against the barbers (there is also one for it), and we all know that a facebook page means it is serious.

on face of it i can only say it is a wonderful idea. however then i started to think of all the health and safety risks - firstly the damage to your neck as you crane it to get the best view possible. the very real chance that an erect nipple might have your eye out (oo'er missus)not to mention a quick turn of the head to catch a glimpse might end up with not only a wonky hair cut but also a piercing or two from sharp scissors. additionally all those men who go in for a trim and come out bald because they have extended their stay in the chair.
people are worried that their might be some hanky panky going on, seriously is anyone going to try it on with someone holding a pair of scissors?

one anonymous complainant claimed that such an establishment would cater to society's 'lowest common denominator' - this is said in a bad way, when really all it means is the lowest level at which we all share commonality and i am pretty sure that while jay and i would say this is a rocking idea my pal emma has already struck me off her christmas card list for even thinking about it.
i suspect they really meant it would appeal to some people's baser instincts. they are probably right.

the thing is: if the hair cut is shite is it going to be worth the cheap thril. we can all remember at least one bad hair cut experience and how friends and colleagues wouldn't let us live it down.
in norwich not only would you get the ribbing for looking stupid you would also get it for going there to have an oogle.

however the comment that took the biscuit was from another local barber.
"i think it's a gimmick - i can't see the connection between barbering and nudity."
it being a gimmick - can't argue there, in marketing terms that would be called a usp - unique selling property.
but how can you be a barber and not see the connection bewteen barbering and nudity. my parent led trips to the barber were my first introduction to 'durex' (other brands are available). my local barber effectively sold a sex aid to all the virile (and not so) men who came to have a bit of the top, and he did it with the immortal words 'and would sir like something for the weekend'.

i confess that might be a generational thing - as over the years my experience of barbers and hairdressers has been minimal.

still in norwich you might be able to have a bit on the side with your bit off the top.

2011-12-03T01:30:00.002Z

when it comes to creative genius those that truly deserve the label are few and far between.
how odd then that there are two gormley's who could be said to be at the top of the creative game.
antony gormley is a british born sculptor, famous for using his own body as a template for many of his pieces, who has given us wonders such as the 'angel in the north'and 'the field'. there can be little doubt that antony is one of the greats of modern sculpture.

here is the angel of the north

and here are two versions of the field (this work changes depending on the location that it is erected in)

across the atlantic there is mark gormley who is making waves in a different creative field: music.
mark gormley is a singer songwriter who, sadly, hasn't had the recognition that he should have had. a friend of mine who knows how much i love good art and good music (hello yabs) alerted me to this superstar in the making.
check mark out.
give him a listen.
then tell me you don't love it.

mark rocks and so should you!

irked

2011-12-01T23:43:00.005Z

being irked seems to be an permanent ongoing state for me.
the actual irks come and go, the state of irk stays.

as i was out this evening and there was a fine drizzle coming down i was wondering to myself where is winter hiding. it seems very shy this year. not sure why i am complaining as i have no heating, so a mild winter is the best for me.
but as i am a contrarian i can't help but like the winter - full on cold, ice, snow and rain.
call me odd if you must.

well tongiht it was just a fine drizzle.
that didn't stop the people with super large umbrellas from coming out in force and opening up their marquees on sticks and then deciding that they are just going to walk happily down the pavement and ignoring everyone else.
they are not going to move that fucking brolly - you have to get out of their way.

i tell you where i would like to stick that bumbershoot.

the second thing to irk me today (there were others but it is late and i want to keep this short) was to do with choice.
i love books. i have more books than most people. i have more books than i could read in a lifetime, i probably have enough unread books that i never need to buy a new one and still not finish them before my dotage kicks in.
i had finished a rather disappointing crime novel last night.
so i needed something new to read tonight.
i had a hankering for some horror.
do i have some horror novels. yes. could i find one. no.
so now what?
as i looked at piles, shelves and boxes of books nothing shouted out at me 'read me you fat fuck. read me'. no all i got was 'you might like me' or 'i'm an ok read' or 'you've been meaning to read me for a long time.'
aaaargh too much choice.

in the end i found a horror, of a sorts. so now i am going to curl and see if nancy a. collins is as much fun as she was back when i first read her in the 90s and before sexy and hip vampires became the default mode for pretty much every horror writer (oh ok i am exaggerating that point, just a little bit).
now i am just irked by the ugly typeface that futura, the publishers, have chosen.

shit: sometimes there is no pleasing me.

overheard

2011-12-01T23:43:00.004Z

rushing to catch sainsbury's before it closed (ooh that makes it sound like i have a busy and hectic life and schedule as opposed to being a lazy so and so who leaves everythign to the very last minute)i find myself on a relatively empty street. nice and easy no who has the right of way as everyone chooses the same line, no being stuck behind dawdling pedestrians who shamble zombie like or are more interested in the screens of their smart phones (would it be possible to have iq tests for users of such phones - if you are not clever enough then all you can have is a stupid phone) than where they are going.

anyway there i am pootling along at a fair old pace.
bloke with his golden haired dog (no idea what the breed is - i just know it goes woof woof)out for a late night constitutional and a fag.
bloke seems a little surprised that the dog is stopping at pretty much every tree and lamp-post it goes by.
stop.
leg cock.
how's your father.
leg down.
move on.
repeat process.

now i am not much of a dog person or an animal person (and many would say i am not that much for people either) but even i know a dog likes to cock its leg on things like trees, bollards, ticket machines etc.
why the owner was shocked will remain a mystery.

on about the fifth stop and leg cock the owner said to the dog 'they are just trees, they are all alike you know.'

the dog's reply will also remain a mystery.

economics

2011-11-30T00:07:00.000Z

and what have we learnt from the mr. osborne's autumn statement?
we learnt that they have no idea what they are talking about.
by 'they' i mean all the experts, and not just mr. osborne. they all pretend like economics is somehow scientific, yet pretty much each week they change their views on what is going to be happening in the next year or month.

even the welcome news that mr. osborne and his chums are going to pump £5bn into the economy for 'shovel-ready' projects is tempered by the idea that he wants to get a further £20bn from british institutions.
this would be a little like he was expecting the private sector to step up and employ all the people he was going to make unemployed. we knew then it wouldn't happen and we can pretty much guess that the £20bn isn't going to be forthcoming.

look at the OECD or the ratings agencys and tell me that they are not making it up as they go along. it is a bloke on the roof licking his finger and hoping to get a message from the wind.

they just don't know what they are talking about.

consumption

2011-11-28T23:43:00.002Z

those who have been regular readers of my outpourings will have realised that i am not a big fan of christmas.
i am not a fan.
i am pretty much the grinch, but without the change of heart.
i hate the forced jolity of it all.
i hate the sappy music that invades everything.
most of all i hate the rampant commercialism of it.

so imagine how much i like watching tv ads that just bascially tell you to 'buy, buy, buy and buy some more.'

that is until i saw the lttlewoods christmas 2011 ad. i love the fact it just tells you straight - buy lots and put it on credit, while at the same time puncturing the dreams of little kids.
fantastic.

enjoy

40 seconds of capitalism - the new true spirit of the christmas season.

£1

2011-11-24T23:22:00.002Z

it was recently announced that addidas are going to launch a £1 pair of trainers in india.
this begs the question why do their trainers cost so much in the rest of the world.

one can only imagine that the plan is to use the £1 trainer as a loss leader to break into the vast indian market with the hope that as large working class population start to earn more money they will stick with addidas as the brand to have so that as the price of the trainers steadily rises until they start making a profit.
a long term stategy, with the potential to lose a lot of money at the start and a long time to get back into profit.

so i come back to my original question why can't they provide cheaper trainers in the uk?

leonardo

2011-11-23T23:46:00.003Z

i love art.
there are few things in this world that i like better than wandering around a gallery stroking my chin and pontificating (to myself) about the meaning of life and art. i'll gaze upon the art and allow myself to wonder at the majesty of artistic creation.
true there are times when as i look at a piece of art it is all i can do to hold back the guffaws of laughter at something that looks as if it has been thrown together during the advert break in x-factor.
and there lies the beauty of art, because it is in the eye of the beholder. one man's work of genius is another man's scratching on tracing paper.

the national gallery is one of the finest places to go and see art. so much to love, so much to enjoy.

right now they have 'leonardo: painter at the court of milan' on. it is what is called a 'blockbuster' show, which means a lot of people want to go. it also means that if you go you get to see the works on display in pretty crushed conditions as people huddle around the art, shuffle slowly along from one piece to another piece. there is no time to cogitate on the artist's work because someone is impatient to get to where you are standing.

the standard ticket price is £16. if you can get it. the bbc reports that tickets are selling for up to £400 on ebay and other such sites.

the national gallery has responded by saying that such 'resold' tickets would be cancelled and no money refunded (i guess if you have splurged £400 for a ticket - getting £16 is an additional kick in the teeth).
according to the national gallery such practice is against their terms and conditions.
i have never understood this.
look i am no fan of touts - but if people are prepared to pay very much over the odds for the ticket then that is their choice.
it is not like the national couldn't do something about the demand. the show runs until february 2012 and it looks as if it is going to be a big seller throughout that period. so rather than bemoan that tickets are being sold at a profit why not take a leaf out of the bank of england's book and print more tickets.
hold on pat you have just said the place is crowded.
i know i did. i know.
so how do i square that circle. easy peasey lemon squeezy.
open the gallery earlier and keep it open longer. those extra hour slots you charge more for the ticket prices to pay for the overtime. if people are prepared to pay £400 then they will pay £20 or £25.
not only that but think of the additional merchandise moved - books, posters, magnets, postcards and the all important gifts - because as we all know christmas is here and christmas is a time of rampant comsumerism.

so trustees and managers of the national gallery i give you a solution to your ticket problem and a way to make even more money.

no need to thank me - just send me a couple of free tickets.

reports

2011-11-21T23:42:00.002Z

there are times when i wonder why people bother writing reports, why they spend so much time investigating something in order to come to their conclusions.

now it could just be the way these things are covered in the media that gives the impression that it was a lot of work for no real purpose.
you can see it in all the obesity reports - none of them seem to say that the reason so many of us are fat is that we eat too much and do too little. pretty simple. i should get a grant for that.
or a recent church of england study found out that for most of the people who worked in the financial sector money was their main motivation.
no. fucking. shit.

so it comes as no surprise that the high pay commission has 'revealed'that pay and bonuses for top bosses are seen to 'out of control' by most peope.
no. fucking. shit.

in the last 30 years average pay has gone from approximately £6,500 to £26,000 per year. an increase of 300%.
in the same time the increase of top executives has risen by 4,000%. nice work if you can get it.
(which begs the question why not outsource the executives - i am pretty sure that for every well paid suit in a london office i can find you someone in india who could do the job at a quarter of the price and just as well and can do it from their bedroom on the internet. it is a global world after all. except it will never happen).

there are some recommendations such as a pay ratio between those at the top and those at the bottom, that employees should be on the remuneration committees, simplifying executive pay, publishing details of executive pay.

none of them will happen.

this christmas and new year we will have the usual hand-wringing over bonuses to various people. we will gasp at the numbers some people will get. we will complain about some of the figures they get. it will be raised in the media, debated in the media.
the usual arguments of 'if you want the best you have to pay the best' will be trotted out, when patently we don't seem to have the best - because if they were that good then we wouldn't be in the shitty position we are in now.

still i am sure someone somewhere has a report that explains just why so many of these people are worth so much for doing so badly.

running

2011-11-20T23:56:00.003Z

i have started running again.
boy does it hurt.
i go out in the early morning. it is dark and it is cold. so why do i go out then?
simple.
no one to see me suffering.
oh how i wish that were the case. my run takes me between a couple of mosques - so the faithful get to see me as i plod along. it must be a joy to them to see someone huffing and puffing down the street.
then there is the guy who is already in the park doing his stretches for his run. i have yet to see him run, i am sure that is because he doesn't want to show me up. it wouldn't be hard.
then there are there are the park wardens - don't get to see them too often - just often enough to remind me that there is someone out there watching.
let's not forget those hardy souls who are making their way to work at 7am - all looking bright and bushy tailed while i am doubled over gasping for more air while sweat pools on the ground below me.
i also get to say hello to the one or two early drunks who are getting a start on their daily intake of booze.

why have i started running again?
need to lose some of that weight i have put on from eating too many doughnuts.
not sure it is working, though i do remember that lovely sign that appeared in gyms 'no pain, no gain'.
well i have the pain.
waiting to see the gain (or the gut loss in my case).

class

2011-11-17T23:49:00.002Z

say what you will about silvio berlusconi (and there are a lot of people who will have a lot to say about him now he is no longer in power and exempt from the courts)but you have to admire a man who has been thrown out of office, faces a number of charges who uses his first week of not being the prime minister to release his latest album of love songs.
while silvio has had a career as a cruise ship crooner he will not be singing the songs. he has just penned them. inbetween matters of state, bedroom antics and a financial crisis that has rocked the free world he had written 11 love songs for the album. good for him.

british politicians must look at their european counterparts and wish that attitudes at home were so relaxed.
think of poor old boris accused of not being able to run london because in his spare time (note the word spare) he wrote a book. various labour politicians accusing him of not spending enough time on london - i guess when ken is in power he will not sleep. at all.
or the various chaps who have been undone by a bit of hanky panky.
they must all look to the continent and sigh 'why couldn't it be like that here.'

i wonder what that says about us?
nosy busybodies i think it says.

liz

2011-11-15T23:46:00.004Z

i may have mentioned this before.
i may have confessed this before.
even so i think it can stand to be said again. i love liz jones.
there i have said it. it is out in the open.
i love liz jones. see i said it again. (i won't say it five times as who knows what i might conjure up).

liz (aaaah) writes a column in the daily mail.

the daily mail is an odious read that plays on the petty hates and fears of much of the population. it is a paper that isn't afraid to ignore the facts in order to have a sensational headline.
while liz faces competition from the likes of mad mel, pious peter and wanker littlejohn she stands head and shoulders over them.
liz is a colossus of the written word.

with all of that said i have to admit that i am not even sure that liz is a real person.
i would like to think that every word she writes comes from the heart. her love of animals, her love of fashion, her anorexia, her self-absorbtion, her adventures in retailland. all of it is enthralling and entertaining.

however there is just a hint, just a suggestion that liz is made up. that liz jones is sitting back laughing at her readership for believing anything she writes.

regardless of that i love liz. and i don't mind admitting it.

employment

2011-11-14T23:39:00.002Z

so here i am back on the post work scrapheap.

i am not keen on being here. there are few upsides to being out of work (regardless of what the 'daily mail' or 'the sun' have to say on the matter). it does mean i have more time to read the books i have and i have time to see art shows. it also means i don't have money to spend on tat (that said i don't have money to spend on good suff either).

one of the reasons that there are various 'occupy' protests around the world is that for all the talk about people should get jobs the simple truth of the matter is that there are not that many jobs out there.

it is all rather depressing.

the gloom isn't lifted by a recent report that says that private businesses are not employing staff in the numbers that david cameron and george osborne had claimed they would (look we all knew they were chatting shit - but hey they weren't teh ones who were going to suffer).
what makes it even worse is that ever initiative about employment is aimed at the 16-25s, as if they are the only ones who can't find a job.
as if that wasn't enough in an economic landscape where the retirement age gets older and older there have been moves by the coalition to get down on the red tape that business has to deal with and part of that is making it easier for them to sack people without cause - a move that is aimed at the overs 50s.

so the picture is bleak.
it is time that the government started looking to see what they are going to do to help employment, for all, in this country.

what they will do is talk nice about it, sound like they are really upset for those of us who can't find work but really the likes of cameron and osborne couldn't give two monkey's ball sacks about the unemployed - as far as they are concerned it is not their problem it is our fault.

x

2011-11-13T23:28:00.002Z

they are conducting an experiment to study the conditions at the earth’s core. the id24 beam will use x-ray beams to subject iron and other materials to extraordinary temperatures and pressures. this will give and insight to the mysterious processes going on at the earth’s core.
laboratory experiments are needed because the earth’s core some 1900 miles below sea level will never be reached by scientists – even though there are still attempts to drill through the earth’s outermost layer, the crust.
yet for many the answer is a simple one – the hollow earth.
there is david innes’ pellucidar where dinosaurs still roam and where the primitive human’s are controlled by the mahars, flying reptiles with dangerous psychic powers. don’t worry though david innes and his pal abner perry soon sort that out.
david icke’s vision of the hollow earth, well if not hollow that there are vast regions inside it where highly developed civilisations live and these are, of course, ancient societies. icke cites jules verne as someone who knew a thing or two about the hollow earth and that reptiles are the main enemies that the explorers of verne’s ‘journey to the centre of the earth’ have to face.
mmm those pesky reptiles again.
nor will the x-ray experiment find admiral byrd’s ‘land of everlasting mystery’ (he discovered in 1947, don’t worry all evidence of his find has been suppressed which is why you don’t know it), nor the inner earth ufo’s that ray palmer believes are there.
it is a shame this x-ray experiment isn’t going to find a hollow earth with lost societies, because if it did then it would mean we could send the contestants and judges of the x-factor there and i would never have to hear from them or about them again.

why

2011-11-12T13:52:00.000Z

why is it suddenly the fashion for bands to tour 'their album'?
don't get me wrong i like metallica's 'black album' it has some very fine songs on it - but do i want them to tour it and play it in it's entirity? nope.
did i prefer dio when he did his greatest hits gig or when he did the 'holy diver' album from start to finish? you bet it was the greatest hits.
sure there are some bands i would want to hear the whole album played from start to finish - but they are prog bands and concept albums. or they are live albums - when i went to see thin lizzy on the live and dangerous tour; that was what i wanted to hear. the same with the tubes on the 'what do you want from live', but when i saw them do 'remote control' i wanted the best bits from that - plus the stuff from the other albums.

other bands - tour your new album, play the best songs from that and the best songs from your back catalogue. keep the fans happy. don't just come here and go i can't be arsed to think of a set listing so we are going to do our album in well fell swoop.