tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84670034531361312332024-03-13T10:04:16.063+00:00Idle Musings On The WorldBringing the Internet into disrepute since late last year.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.comBlogger128125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-9983485279917739362013-04-29T02:42:00.001+01:002013-04-29T02:42:16.419+01:00Fernando TorresThere's been a lot of sporting discussion over Fernando Torres ever since he left Liverpool for Chelsea. The man has been through a catastrophic loss of form. There's been several competing theories for this loss of form, some based on insider knowledge of the club, some based on internet theorising. I'm going to outline none of them here. What I am going to do is make up several possible examples:<br /><br /><b>1. </b>F<span class="userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}"><span class="text_exposed_show">ernando
Torres has been afflicted with existential nihilism ever since someone gave him some
Kierkegaard and Schopenhauer (Because 'Nando has been obsessed with
famous sideburns of the 19th century since he read a picture book on the
Crimean war and saw Lord Cardigan in action, moments before his
displaying his daring George Osborne-esque leadership capabilities) to
read on the train to London to sign his contract with Chelsea, and since then has
been stumbling around the pitch in a cloud of nihilistic despair,
frequently shouting after mistimed shots "Goal, no goal, what does it
matter?! It's all a decorative façade on the perpetual insignificance of
my meaningless existence!" (Rafa Benitez has tried to coach this out of
him to no avail, by shouting at him during training sessions "You lend
your own life whatever significance it possesses! Each of your
accomplishments may be insignificant on a grander scale but within your
own existence, they are important and valued! You have an obligation to
your own existence to try and take as much advantage of it as possible!
Now run the channels and try to stay onside!", to which captain John Terry intervened with "Oh, you're taking a simplistic view of the matter, We have a fundamental need to have our accomplishments validated by other people, a need to feel important, and if we recognise that, ultimately on a grand enough scale, that need will never be satisfied, that we are unimportant and insignificant, it's as bad for us as asking us to go without our other needs, like food and drink. You can't ask this man, starved of importance, to play football!" to which Rafa replied "Ultimately, a skeleton doesn't need very much food, does it? His need to feel important will be satiated in his own lifetime, much like his hunger. After he dies, he may be forgotten, but he will also be hungry. He doesn't seem to be worried about that. Now get back on the pitch and practice picking up stupid red cards!").<br /><br /><b>2. </b>In children's books related to football, frequently the protagonist, some sort of aspiring young footballer, usually one with an older brother with whom they play in the garden under the watchful eye of a kindly grandfather, gets a new pair of boots/goalkeeping gloves that magically improve his game (as opposed to the hard work and practice other kids have to do, the fools). This old story is not just a fable, it actually happened to Torres, a man with an older brother and a grandfather who loved Atlético Madrid, who had a magical pair of football boots. Sadly, on his move to Chelsea, he forgot to include the stipulation that he wore these boots, and, upon seeing these unsponsored monstrosities, Chelsea's kitman threw them straight into the bin before Torres' first game for Chelsea. Ever since, he has been unable to play football to the levels he once could, and can be frequently found scouring charity shops across the country for new boots, asking shop assistants to throw him a football and seeing if he can hit a left foot volley into the coat rack.<br /><br /><b>3. </b>He has been distracted from his football because he is writing a new screenplay about a team of footballers from North Korea who win the World Cup, and announce their dislike of their dictatorial monarchy to an admiring nation, who begin to see through the propaganda and stage a rebellion within their own country, toppling Kim Jong-Un and ushering in a new dawn of diplomatic talks and international acceptance of a more democratic nation. Indeed, the captain of the side, who goes on to lead the nation, announces to a UN meeting "The craziest thing that Kim Jong-Un did was have nuclear weapons. We wish the US and Russia to remind the world that they are not like our old regime. We came to clarity and saw the flaws in such a scheme; we can only hope America and Russia can do the same. Mutual destruction is not the future we wish to see; There is a place in this world for mutual construction. Help us build a better world." leading to multilateral disarmament talks brokered by the North Koreans, and the eventual abandonment of all nuclear weapons programmes worldwide. It's called "Coup du Monde", because he thinks that's clever (A coup is the overthrow of the government, the Coupe du Monde is the World Cup in French)(I said HE thought it was clever, not that it was. Get off my back, alright?).<br /><br />Those are just three potential stories for the tabloids to run regarding Fernando Torres' continued lack of ability to kick a football into a net. I expect a Sun special pull-out booklet on possible reasons for his loss of form ("Where has Torres gone?", with a picture of a dejected looking Fernando on the cover) which, as well as these listed above, also implicates Torres as the full-time head of a crime family, one of 5 players who had their talent stolen by the Monstars for a 5-a-side game versus the Looney Tunes</span></span><span class="userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}"><span class="text_exposed_show"> (Space Jam reference. The Sun would also name the other 4)</span></span><span class="userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}"><span class="text_exposed_show">, setting up a sideline in personally hand-crafted mugs and building a 1:16 scale Delorean from toothpicks in his garage.</span></span>idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-30662640286370145312013-04-29T01:52:00.000+01:002013-04-29T13:06:46.584+01:00Careers.As a young man, I've reached a stage in my life where the idealism of my childhood has to have a jarring encounter with the pragmatic demands of reality. I'm considering potential careers for myself, and I'm in a position where I'm becoming forced to abandon the dreams of my youth and instead face up to the bleak drudgery of a job I don't really WANT. <br />
<br />
Some kids grow up saying "I want to be a vet! I love helping rabbits and I've seen Bambi.", and then those children end up working hard at school to get good grades, then becoming vets. However, I encounter significantly fewer children growing up saying to their parents "Mummy, when I grow up, I want to be a chartered accountant on £27k a year with 21 days of flexible holidays and a competitive bonus structure with opportunities across the country.", and yet, inexplicably, there are literally dozens of accountants all over the world. <br />
<br />
There are two options for the people who have chosen a career that nobody appears to WANT to do from a young age. The first is fairly mundane: They didn't have any particularly strong aspirations as a child. Their self-image didn't really include a career (At a young age, it tends to revolve around allowing yourself to stay up late and eat as many chocolate digestives as you want want when you grow up), and so when the time came to pick a career, they were working with a blank slate, so to speak. They needed an activity to fund the sort of things they did aspire to as a kid (Television and chocolate digestives), rather than that activity being a desirable pastime in and of itself. The single most depressing statement I've ever heard another person utter is "I would sit in a dark room for 8 hours a day for £40k a year". For these people, work is a means to an end.<br />
<br />
The second category is significantly worse. These are people who did have some sort of childhood dream, but the necessities of reality impinged on it, and they had to trade that ideal for a pragmatic reality. Perhaps our hypothetical childhood vet wasn't quite academically gifted enough to break into the world of animal practice. The career they wanted was closed off to them, and they had to accept the disappointing situation and from this, conjure up a new career. It's not really what they wanted to do, but hey, maybe telemarketing isn't so bad! And they do give you a decent salary and if you keep at it, you could be a manager inside two years and have your own office by the time you're 30. These people had hopes and ambitions for their careers that lie shattered by the wayside, and now spend 8 hours a day in a compromise, a perpetual admittance of the fact they betrayed their inner child and let him down. <br />
<br />
The best way I've found for handling decisions is to ask myself what I would do when I was 10. When you're 10, the difficulties and complexities of life don't impinge on your decision-making. What your inner 10 year old wants is what you really want. You then have to obviously temper this desire with your adult viewpoint. For example, my inner 10 year old wants me to eat a chocolate bar and stay up late, but my adult viewpoint says "If I eat a chocolate bar, I'll get fat, and if I stay up late, I'll be tired tomorrow morning". In this way, I manage to try and work out what I actually want deep down, and then try to find a way to make it work with the adult reality of my situation (For example, I'll eat the chocolate bar and go for a run tomorrow, or stay up late and wake up late tomorrow).<br />
<br />
I find myself facing a similar dilemma now, in terms of career. It's becoming increasingly obvious that I am, despite my inner 10 year old's desires, very unlikely to become a professional footballer and part-time rock god. It's one thing to have to make concessions in reality to move closer to the idealised wishes of the 10 year old. But it's quite another to have make concessions to the idealised wishes of the 10 year old to reach a compromise with reality. Especially in this case, as it isn't so much a concession as a complete demolition of the 10 year old desires. I understand that this is simply the pragmatic decision and one that has to be taken, but it's still incredibly frustrating and disappointing to feel you can't actually live up to your internal aspirations, even for reasons outside your control (I could be an excellent shepherd, but fiscally, that would be a poor move, for example). <br />
<br />
I'll join the hordes in their compromise careers, filing on to busy motorways at 8:20 am, on my way to a job I don't care about. And I'll have to do this until I retire. Maybe I'll grow to enjoy that job, but it'll still always be a compromise, a reminder of the fact that when my ideals and realities came to blows, I had to shout "Stop the fight! STOP THE FIGHT!" and throw in the towel on behalf of my ideals. <br />
<br />
PS. This has been very rambly. This is because it's exam time, and thus everyone I know is busy, and I am cooped up in a small room gradually getting cabin fever, and through The Sopranos. idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-2070349838591243162013-01-25T00:16:00.002+00:002013-01-25T00:16:51.751+00:00FearsMy fears are not the tangible things that can actually kill you (I'm not afraid of great heights. I'm afraid of FALLING from great heights, or even more pedantically, suddenly not falling any more), but the more quirky, conceptual horrors. Obviously, I do have, to a certain extent, fears grounded in physical harm, but those are fairly standard, and thus not of note. These are my fears.<br /><br />Failure. If you never try at something, you can rationalise it as,
in some weird way, not failing, but the rather more ego-satisfying "not
trying". "Oh yeah, well, I could be a world-class boxer if I dedicated
four years to it, sure!" I can say, confident that I will never actually
test this theory. Not trying is simply a much more energy-efficient
method of not succeeding. It's a useful shortcut to failure, in which
you don't have the soul-destroying experience of being bad at something
before even getting competent. To come back to the earlier example, me
taking up boxing would be several weeks of me getting punched in the
face as I get gradually exhausted, fleeing and trying to hide from
someone in what is essentially a small empty square. But if you never
try at anything, you won't ever get past that terrible beginner stage,
and reach the point where you are not completely awful at something,
merely fairly abysmal. As an associate to this, there's the resigned
indifference to your own failings. "Oh yeah" you mutter. "I'm just bad
at that.", rather than thinking "I should try and get better at it by,
y'know, working on it, rather than perpetually explaining I simply can't
do it.". <br /><br />I'm not doing it properly. Regardless of what "it" is. "Woah there, am I holding this burger wrongly?" (Yes. Ketchup fell down my sleeve, which is basically the standard for not holding something correctly, uncontrollable condiments), "Should I be brushing my teeth like this?" (If someone stabs you with a pointy stick and you start bleeding, it's not because you're not flossing efficiently. It's because they have stabbed you with a pointy stick. Similarly, even if you use shower gel and a loofah, if someone prods your chest with a dagger, you'll bleed. Copiously, I imagine). Should I carry my wallet in this pocket or that one? Oh, man, I've not got a Tesco clubcard. Better apologise! (I do this every time. As if the cashier is going to reach over the counter and grab me by the lapels, before shouting into my face "God, you useless wanker! You never shop anywhere else! You'd have enough points to be regional manager for Tesco by now as a reward! Just get your bloody life in order!" unless I include the contrite, mumbled appendage to my confession of not having a clubcard). Basically the haunting spectre of self-doubt and personal recrimination hangs in my thoughts. I've changed my handwriting three times in a bid to try and find one that can be considered neat and efficient, for example. <br /><br />Everything I do is meaningless. Maybe that's why there's no point in doing anything. We are all Ozymandias. Most of us aren't revered in our times. None of us will be revered given a suitably long timescale (My legacy may well be pretty massive, obviously, but I sincerely doubt it'll outlast the eventual heat-death of the universe). Existential nihilism is a spectacular fear, making you disillusioned and cynical. You are meaningless, and everything you do is meaningless. Why do anything? So there's fundamentally no long-term advantage to doing anything. There's not much short-term advantage to it either because...<br /><br />Creation leads to critique. Nothing you ever create can please all of the people all of the time (Even, astonishingly, these writings. I am as surprised as you are), and the people who aren't pleased are rarely shy in saying so. This, unsurprisingly, is a disappointing experience, and deeply dissuasive. If you never create anything, nothing you are responsible for and inherently therefore, proud of, can be criticised. It's analogous (Sort of.) to building a tower people occasionally knock down. It's such a dispiriting experience to have it knocked down, eventually you stop trying to build the tower at all. What's worst is the certain knowledge that I used to be ashamed of my own lack of tower, so I'd wander round knocking down someone else's. I guess this is one of the primary motivating factors behind it. This is inherently linked to the fear of failure, not meeting the subjective analysis of someone else being defined as failure, for some reason.<br /><br />This one is a combination! I'm not particularly scared of either on its own, but when I think about them in conjunction, I panic. My mortality and my own lack of direction. I don't know what I want to do. This in itself is a pretty normal thought process, many of us spiral repeatedly in our little vehicle round the roundabout of life, looking for an interesting exit. The trouble begins when you realise your little car is running out of fuel all the time, and you have no idea what exit you want and there's definitely not a petrol station nearby. To extend the metaphor far too much. Then you panic about whether you should just take the next exit just to get off the roundabout. Or whether you should stay on, trying to find the best exit for you. Basically, I think "Hey, it doesn't matter that you have no clear-cut ambitions yet! You've got plenty of time." and my mind goes "Do we? I'm pretty sure that's not right. We've got like, 60 more years. Max. And only like, 30 more good ones. If you keep fit. Which you don't."<br /><br />All of these make for awful Hallowe'en costumes. "What as you dressed as?" "The harrowing reality of your dwindling existence. You?" "I...I am a shark." "I hope you feel you spent the time making that wisely. You'll never get it back." "Goodness. Your costume IS good." "Thanks. More punch?" "No. No I think I might go home. And think. You know. About everything." "Okay. Have a nice night!". idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-30512880049671924972012-10-01T22:25:00.001+01:002012-10-01T22:25:37.701+01:00Minors' Strike <span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;">
In Fotheringhamton today, there was surprise news when the entirety of Fotheringhamton Gardens primary school unanimously voted to strike “until our concerns have been answered”.
Class representative Tommy Smith (11) and headteacher Sandra Wilson
(51), met to discuss a series of issues, including but not limited to, the
number of benches in the playground, a discussion on the idea of allowing
football to be played in designated playground areas, and “the weird smell in
the male changing rooms” [sic]. According to both parties, things came to a
head in a discussion over Mr Lowson, the PE teacher, and undisclosed activities
within aforementioned changing rooms, and, with neither participant willing to
budge on the issue, Mr Smith decided to walk out of talks and convene with his
members to discuss further action. Miss Jenkins (8) told us that these talks
were brief and “Within minutes, we decided the best course of action was a
strike. When laid out objectively, the problems lay deeper than these
superficial concerns initially raised and ran right at the heart of this school.
We cannot continue to be treated like second-class citizens and ignored!”. We
spoke to a spokesperson from the school board, who told us “If they don’t want
to be treated like children, perhaps they shouldn’t act like them. We’re ready
and waiting to reconvene talks when they are willing to grow up and be adult about
necessary compromises”. Mrs Wilson was unavailable for personal comment, and Mr
Lowson would only direct us to the school board’s comments, whilst repeatedly stating
that “They are only allegations, and, need I remind you, until proven guilty, I
am legally innocent, and on that I consider the matter closed”. <br />
<br />
A spokesperson, 9 year old Jessica Floris, for Mr Smith said he would be
releasing a statement later this afternoon that would cover a wider range of
the issues involved. She allowed us to view an unfinished draft of the speech,
which included such topics as “If David Cameron and his ilk are so fond of a
voluntary “Big Society”, why must I be legally mandated to attend classes every
day for no pay when I could, and some would argue SHOULD, be out in the real
world earning a wage. If education was deemed to be vital to my success, surely
I should have my university fees paid for by governmental contributions, and if
it’s not considered vital, why must I attend for 11 years of my fledgling
career? Who needs maths when you have calculators? I can already read and
write; anything further seems excessive and superfluous to my requirements. I’m
sure Mrs Wilson is sitting very superciliously in her ivory office while the
plebs strike, but the fact of the matter is that she is part of the problem
with this culture”. Ms Floris said that such inflammatory comments were likely
to be edited down in the final version, but that this draft clearly showed the
anger Mr Smith felt towards the “petty bureaucrats” limiting “the potential of
every child entering the system”, and the “authoritarian stance” the school
took on every issue being “indicative of a closed-minded, dogmatic society unwilling to advance as part of a more progressive society". <br />
<br />
We asked some of the strikers what this meant to them, as they picketed the
school gates. Trevor Pittins, aged 6, said “It’s scandalous the way they treat
us in there! Do this, do that, pick that up, don’t throw that in here... Let me
live my own life, Mrs Jones!”, while Harry Fligart told us “We’re in here,
every day, 8:30 am till 3:15 pm, with a strictly regimented break system, for
no money, and we’ve no choice in the matter. There are prisoners that get
treated better than us, and I tell you what, I bet their cells are nicer than
our bloody classrooms, pardon my French”, but these are counter-balanced by
participants such as Patrick Gossomer, who said “Well, it’s a day off, isn’t
it? I’m sure the powers that be will have the whole thing sorted out within a
few days”. In a day of uncertainties, the only thing we can know for sure is
that this isn’t the last you’ll hear about this story.</span>idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-21536063059724386182012-08-31T02:02:00.000+01:002012-08-31T02:02:54.105+01:00The Future-PhoneI hold in my hand, a smartphone. Now, like many people who have spent the last 5 years living in the past, yearning for the days when all a man needed to fix anything in his house was a screwdriver, a socket set, and a bit of mechanical knowhow, I have never had a smartphone before. Obviously, holding it in my hand is making it difficult to type, so I'm putting it down on the desk beside, but the point is still valid: I have a magic touchscreen device which can play music and make phone calls and has a built in VCR and all the other usual features.<br /><br />After the minor hassle of sorting out a contract in order to get and use my phone (£853 a day or whatever it is), I received the phone the day after I ordered it. Well, hypothetically it was delivered then. DPD said they would deliver it between 08:00 and 18:00. "Fair enough", I thought. "Set themselves an ambitious ten hour window to turn up at my house for less than a minute. They love a challenge, don't they?". I can be witheringly sarcastic inside the solitude of my own head. Well, as if hearing my complaints that "Some time today" was a little vague, they sent me a new text telling me that Alex, "my DPD driver" would be there between "17:02 and 18:02". It's that extra two minutes either side which really lend it the glorified air of impending accuracy. "They've calculated this down to the nanosecond back at the transport lab!" I mused to myself. "I shall strive to be in during that very specific hour!". 17:02 rolled on, in the manner time is rather accustomed to, and I sat, nervously, excitedly, beside the door. 17:32 came and went, and the eager joy on my face started to turn to anxious panic, like a barometer that has shifted suddenly from "Set fair" to "Batten down the hatches, it's a big storm!". 18:02 flickered past my eyes, shamefully, embarrassed about its presence and the accompanying shame that came with it for DPD. They were late! "Well, now, what's a couple of minutes between friends, eh? Me and Alex! We're on first name terms. You can't blame him for being a couple of minutes late!". I had a thing to do that evening (For those of you wishing to keep fully informed, imagine it was, say, an ambassador's function, or perhaps a well-heeled millionaire's bachelor party. It really doesn't matter. It was an unavoidable event), but I wouldn't have to leave for that till 7:30. "88 minutes late, he'd have to be, for me to miss him! Haha! Can you imagine such a thing!". I chuckled to myself at the minorly amusing set of circumstances I'd laid out before my very eyes. Alex would never do that to me. He wouldn't betray me like that. And truth be told, he didn't betray me like that. He turned up fully 97 minutes after we had agreed, unilaterally from HIS side, that he would attend. I was already gone, so he put a little cheeky note through my door. "Sorry we missed eachother!", or words to that effect. Just a friendly note, with overtones of "Tsk, what are we like eh, me and you?! You go one way and I come in the other! Haha, Us, eh?!". No, Alex and DPD, YOU. I was in for 11 and a half hours waiting for my phone to arrive. I had sat, eagerly, to watch you crush my dreams to ashen dust in your misshapen paws, for nearly half a day. We live in a world in which I can hold a magical touchscreen device which connects to the internet, sends and receives messages instantly, and comes with an auto-rewind function, and yet you couldn't drive to my bloody house in over ten hours?! Fortunately, Alex and I worked it all out (I think we both said a few things we regretted, admittedly mainly me), and then, promptly the next day, Alex turned up with my phone.<br /><br />And from there, I powered it up, and indeed, left it powering up as I went to do another thing (I'm a very busy man: These evening soirées with Gloria Hunniford or whatever it is you imagine I do; they don't attend themselves you know). And then, later that very night, I turned it on, and went through the tedious rigmarole of setting it up, which involved a more in-depth grilling than some policemen give prime suspects implicated in a gruesome murder (and which also involved transferring my number from my old phone to my new one, a process made about as quick and painless as an emergency enema with no anaesthetic). But then, THEN, I had a portal to the very future itself.<br /><br />First thing I did, obviously, was try and load it with purchased music. Given that I have spotify (I may have been ignoring the smartphone revolution for nearly 5 years, but I can't afford to miss out on all that music), this means I primarily loaded it with music I bought legally in the past. This means, obviously, that it is shockingly bad. You only buy Kate Nash's hit song "Foundations" once, before you learn your lesson (This is accompanied by Lush Life's "The Music Sounds Better With You" and Bitman and Roban's "Despues de Almuerzo". But balanced out by the whole albums of "Low Vs Diamond" (Yes, I am that obscure. Get me. Oooh) and Jet's debut "Get Born", I reckon), so I'll need to rectify this at some stage.<br /><br />Next thing I did was use it to get my mail. "Now I can get pointless updates from companies I deeply regret allowing to contact me WHEREVER I am!" I thought to myself, with a little wry smile. Witheringly sarcastic, see? That's sort of a call-back. This was surprisingly painless (I had to set up a similar thing once a while ago, and trying to get it to work was like having a tattoo done by a toddler, in that it was very painful, scarred you for life, and wasn't something you'd want to discuss with your neighbours), so this pleased me! Success, 1-0 to the phone in the game of life.<br /><br />Then I had to insert my friend's contact details. This was a tedious process (I can hear you all shouting already, "I've got this one, I've got this one! "All your friends eh? Must have taken you nearly a full minute!". Nailed it! Haha! Come on guys!". A wittier man than me would have a scathing riposte prepared for that sort of obvious put-down, but all I've got is the factual correction that, because of my relatively low typing speed and the newnesss of the phone (and accompanying keyboard) in my hands, it took me almost 5 minutes. Schooled.) from beginning to end, not least because I had to dig out close friends' contact details. Phone numbers was fine. When the phone started asking for their addresses and childhood schools, I bailed on the process and left them with half-complete forms (I'm not sure how much information these things really need, but I filled in the fact one friend's favourite film is The Lion King, another friend's favourite breed of dog was the Maltese, and finally that one of my friends is 6 foot 1 inches tall.), which angered my OCD tendencies a little, but pleased the procrastination and laziness centres of my brain too much to let that worry me.<br /><br />This suitably done, I sent out 5 test text messages, of which one person replied. "Good!" I thought. "Working at exactly the same rate as my old phone". One of these messages was a message to a friend about the fact I was using a smartphone. This is the sort of non-stop thrill-a-minute tedious information you can expect from me if you ever become a close friend. The point was rather, I was using my phone at that very moment to listen to a mash-up song (Dave Brubeck and Radiohead, since you ask. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, ended up being delicious. And that's where the recipe analogy breaks down. The more you know), and reached down to my pocket to get my phone and text a friend about it ("thrill-a-minute" was not overstated, clearly), when I realised "Oh my god! I'm ALREADY holding my phone!". This revelation caused me such delirious joy I sent out a text instantly.<br /><br />I also checked that it does in fact, browse the internet. It does. I have been on the internet before, and was connected to the wifi in my house, so I was pretty underwhelmed by this (Despite the fact that I'm wirelessly receiving information from global servers directly to a small box in my hand, I am underwhelmed. What minor miracle of technology will I have to see before I am again, wowed?). When I'm out and about though, I'm sure I'll look at it and go "OH MY GOD. I'm using the internet. On a BUS! I can get a news source that ISN'T the Metro! And it might contain news, rather than poorly written articles about celebrity gossip, the traditional non-story, usually heavily pictorial ("Me and my waterskiing Daschund!", say, or "What happens when a parrot and a kitten become best friends!"), and some minor coverage of, say, civil war in Syria" (Witheringly sarcastic again! Can you just imagine what a laugh-fest it is in my head? No, you're wrong. You can't. Good effort, though).<br /><br />I haven't even added any apps to it yet. And they're probably the best bit! But I will. And when I do, hoo, boy, the world better be ready for me, because let me tell you, me and my smartphone will be ready for the world.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-78844354652294903512012-08-29T15:06:00.001+01:002012-08-29T15:06:34.116+01:00Frankie Says Retax<span style="font-family: inherit;">Woah, what's that?! Biting satire from nowhere? Weren't expecting that, were you? I didn't think so.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17px;">Nick Clegg is asking for an emergency tax. The emergency being an economic disaster that was widely predicted, and easily preventable. It's a bit like living in a flood plain, in a house made out leaky bricks, that everyone tells you will flood when the rains come, and after it floods, going to your neighbours and saying "Oh my God, my house has flooded, can you believe it, please, lend me a couple of billion pounds, just to help a poor man like me get back on his feet". I'm not sure when we (ie: Politicians, in particular Gideon Osborne) started calling already very rich people "Wealth Creators". If someone hoards newspapers in his house for a decade, he's not a "newspaper creator", he's mental. This is apparently "Pre-Conference Talk", which in generalised terms, is that bit before a minor scuffle in which one party accuses the other of "thinking he's hard", and the accused responds with "Oh, yeah? Wanna go? We'll go right here!", before increasingly specific threats ("I'll shove my boot so far up your arse, you'll think Clarks have started making hats.", etc) that will inevitably, come to nothing and fizzle out amidst complaints of "Leave him Terry, he's not worth it!" and "Back off Darren, you're already on probation!". I'm idly waiting for the Tories to respond with something like "What are these benefit cheats doing eating more than stale bread and water! Unbelievable!" and calling for an end to "Compassionate Conservatism" (They already did that. If this is compassion, I am deeply worried as to what they would be like enraged), and for Labour to complete the Holy Trinity of poor politics by accusing the coalition of "Infighting" and saying "If they can't work together, how can they expect to work with the nation?". </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 17px;"><br />Other news in Britain includes the revelation that the honours are going too heavily towards celebrities and businessmen (And indeed, civil servants, Sir Jeremy Heywood or Sir Bob Kerslake, for example), simply for doing their jobs, rather than going above and beyond the call of duty. Certainly, if the Chief Executive of a FTSE100 company saves an orphanage with his own wealth creation programme, it's more than fair to reward him with a gleaming trinket freshly minted by the Queen herself (That's why they apparently limit it to a quota: Because the Queen stays up overnight once a week minting medals. In 1974, she had to stay up for 4 days in a row before the New Year's honours, having fallen behind earlier in the year, leading many people to claim they had misshapen and incorrectly spelled awards), but if he's simply come into his office everyday and sat at his desk and done his job, that deserves a reward no more than turning up to McDonald's everyday entitles the man in the crap cap to an OBE (I'm a little bitter: I've been rejected by McDonald's 6 times).The honours are supposed to reward those who make a real effort to improve life in Britain, and unless Sir Fred Goodwin did all his work voluntarily, I'm inclined to think he, and I know this might seem outlandish, was motivated solely by greed, heaven forbid such a thing to be true.<br /><br />Still, it could be worse. We could be living in the Islamic Republic of Iran, where Blizzard have just cut off access to that most vital of services: World of Warcraft. US Trade Sanctions have led them to cut off their service in Iran. Surely now, the clamour in Iran for them to stop trying to build a nuclear power station will be overwhelming. Millions will be out in the streets, every day, and won't rest till they get their virtual game back. Iran will be forced to cave. It's not like they've ever had to face protests before. Except when they did, over Ahmadinejad "winning" an election. But they kicked him out straight away, because the people's word is law in Iran. Wait...Wait, I'm just getting message in now that Ahmadinejad is still in power there, and weeks of protests changed absolutely nothing. Tsk.<br /><br />Finally, a joke. I haven't been writing much of late because the police stopped me. I'm still on Proseation.</span></span>idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-50304320605995107212012-02-26T22:30:00.003+00:002012-02-26T23:48:58.861+00:00The Sun on Sunday!I'm a man who, history has documented, is willing to try new things, and this week, I thought "I've never actually bought, and read, the Sun!". Well, when you combine that with the release of the brand-new and not-at-all-like-the-News-of-the-World Sun on Sunday, it was an ideal opportunity to dip my toes into tabloid water. In the interests of a fair comparison, I also got The Mail on Sunday, its main rival in the Sunday paper market. Here is a comparison of each against each other.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><br />The Sun</span> has the newstritional (Deliberate pun) content of a cereal box. If you want a series of insightful, thoughtful articles, examining the biggest issues society faces today, with relevant examples from this week, The Sun is not the place to look. It's like a kid's "My First Newspaper", with big, exciting pictures and small, simple words. Of the opening ten pages, 5 can be considered "News", and three of them are about the "Indy" debate. Seriously, they shorten independence to "indy". It's got 12 letters, I can't be expected to read all of them. They also have "Celebrity" endorsements littered throughout the paper, as this is the glorious first edition, to quote them; "A new era has dawned". One such celebrity endorsement is The Krankies. Oh yes, the ever-relevant Krankies, thank God you sought out their opinion of the paper, I couldn't imagine doing anything without their agreement. Another celebrity was Barbara Rafferty. You know, from Rab C Nesbitt? The wife, of a supporting character! Don't tell me you don't remember! She was on River City, till about 3 years ago? Come on! No? She's one of 3 former River City stars to say the Sun's great. I wouldn't expect you to get the other two either.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Mail</span> isn't exactly content-heavy either, in fairness to the Sun, but it does at least have a token effort at including news (Judging by the randomness of the articles, largely by accident. "Oh no, Mr Dacre, I accidentally ran an article containing news!" "It's too late now, we've already started printing!" is probably a common exchange in the editor's office).<br /><br />Both papers rely heavily on celebrity tittle-tattle to make up for their stunning lack of news. there is however, one news story that featured fairly prominently in the columnists pages for the Sun: Fellow News International war correspondent Marie Colvin's death came up twice, separately. Katie Price (In her articles on page ELEVEN. That's ten pages of sort-of news then "Woah there, but what does celebrity topless model Katie Price make of this!?". The tagline is "The Price is ALWAYS right!", and she talks about private education versus state education, using the damning line "I went to a state school and look how well I've done!". Quite. But if I don't want my daughter stripping for money...) says "She is just the sort of woman who impresses me", while Catriona Shearer also sings her praises. Nothing mentioned of the award-winning war photographer who died with her. Presumably he was just freelance rather than working for NI.<br /><br />The Mail didn't focus on this story much, but how could they with space at such a premium that the story about Tara Palmer-Tomkinson telling Kate that William would come running back to her could only take up a (full) single page? That's a four page spread at least, but they must have somehow whittled it down to one. The Sun weren't quite so economical in their story about Amanda Holden giving birth, unable to get that down, somehow, to less than two pages.<br /><br />Having criticised Katie Price, The Mail's columnists aren't much better, in fairness. Liz Jones looks around the world, sees plague and pestilence across the world, looks at the issues in Syria and Bahrain, looks at the big issue of the day, the Scottish independence debate, glances at the NHS debate, and indeed, the "Slave labour" issue rearing its head, and thinks "The world needs an article, and I am ready to deliver". She sits down at her desk, is presumably briefly possessed (It's the only logical conclusion) and churns out "<span style="font-style: italic;">Someone</span> has to tell the truth about fashion (...Even if it does cost me that lovely olive greatcoat)". Brilliant. Well, thank god you stepped up, Liz, because it doesn't seem particularly likely that anyone else would, and now that Marie Colvin's dead, someone has to nail these big issues. Unbelievable.<br /><br />Mercifully, though, The Sun is slightly less right-wing than the Mail (I kid you not, the Mail has some sort of weird article about the Socialist Worker's Party and its front organisations. Apparently whatever side they are on, "Sensible citizens" should be on the other. It reads like a 1920s piece against the rise of communism. "Sacrificed on the altar of Leftist dogma" may be the weirdest way to end an article since about 1953) but it's hardly the Socialist Worker. Both papers lose marks for showing clear bias here.<br /><br />Additional pull outs and so on, as is standard for Sunday papers, were adequate in both. A decentish sport section, although nothing remarkable. The Mails "You" magazine featured the rest of the aforementioned Tara Palmer-Tomkinson interview which didn't fit in the newspaper. To show you that I've done my reading, she describes herself as "secretly clever". Oh really. I'm secretly very handsome. No, no, I know I don't look it, but that's because it's a secret. I didn't realise we could ascribe ourselves qualities and then put "secretly" before them, and thus, it becomes a perfectly valid statement. The Sun's pull out was "Fabulous" magazine, which had the story article "99 Buy Me Now Shoes". I'll let that speak for the general tone of the thing. Nothing more to say about them, really.<br /><br />In short then: The Mail wins, but only because, at fifty pence, The Sun on Sunday is the best value toilet paper I've ever bought. Don't buy either if you can avoid it.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-92206425258525795542012-01-27T22:49:00.004+00:002012-01-27T23:26:01.422+00:00Small things occasionally about the newsDavid Cameron said: "I often say to my children 'No need to go to the Natural History Museum to see a dinosaur, come to the House of Commons at about half past twelve'.", which Labour took offence at, so Conservative Mark Pritchard said: "I wonder whether this House of Commons would be better with more or less humour?". Judging by the first statement I'd start with introducing some humour, then working our way up. Given that parliamentary footage is explicitly not allowed to be used for comedic purposes, it's a shame Cameron's non-stop gag-reel of a mind is so wasted on an audience of "Politicians and to a lesser extent, people who care about politics". He really zinged that 79 year old, to the extent that he never even knew what hit him. Possible return zings "I often tell my kids that if they fancy hot-air ballooning, it appears the PM has an excess of fuel that they can pick up about now.", or "I tell my children that instead of going to the local farm on the off-chance of seeing a cock crowing to his loyal following chickens, they might as well be certain of it by coming to Prime Minister's Questions". He said neither of these things, by the way.<br /><br />I was in a shop that was playing Falco's seminal German hit "Rock Me Amadeus". It was as close as I'll ever get to time-travel. I felt like going up to the cashier and yelling "WHAT YEAR IS IT?!". At some stage in 2030, someone is going to make this precise joke about current hit "Party Rock Anthem". I sometimes like to remember that one day, that'll come on Radio 2 as one of the "hits from the past" while I'm driving, and I'll sing along, and the children in the car will be horrified. Partly because they're not mine, but mostly because of the song thing. That's a joke obviously; that song will still be cool in 18 years.<br /><br />The Duchess of Cornwall launches a new initiative for kids on Jubilee day: A cooking competition! "Cook for the Queen", presumably shortened from the original title "Cook for the Queen like the worthless peons you are, she demands it of you and who are you to resist the demands of a divinely-chosen being, you pleb?!", aims to unite the children of the UK through their shared love of baking into one joyous nation again. This should single-handedly stop the Scottish independence referendum in its tracks, and grind republicanism to a halt. Anything less and it can only be considered a failure.<br /><br />People have been "Flooding" MPs with questions via twitter for Michael Gove. Over four billion people from around the world have tried to get MPs to ask him "Why are you so hateful?", as well as "A royal yacht?! What sort of austerity measure is handing out free boats?!". One person got halfway through a sensible question about the government's new academy policy before descending into using his remaining characters on "IHATEYOUIHATEYOUIHATEY". Sadly, it closed at 11am, so you've missed your chance to ask a question to Michael Gove.<br /><br />Ed Miliband, as ever a man of the people has had a go at David Cameron about what this week? Let's make it a multiple choice quiz!<br /><br />[a] Swingeing cuts to core services that will leave many in Britain who are reliant on a system of social security, those are the most vulnerable in our society, out of luck as the system abandons them in a desire to save money?<br /><br />[b] The intractable war which Britain has been waging for nearly a decade in the Middle-East, and the PM's position on the apparently growing threat that is Iran?<br /><br />[c] Chocolate Oranges.<br /><br />It's a tough one... Got an answer? Good! If you said [c], well done! If you said [a] or [b], I'm afraid you simply have too much faith in the leader of the opposition to address issues that are actually meaningful or important. You grow out of it, it's a phase, like having faith in the political process, or liking George Michael. Yes, Ed "Fathead" Miliband has pointed out that David Cameron was aghast, appalled and angered by the cut-price chocolate oranges available to fat people at WHSmiths, only 6 years ago, in 2006. And yet, in 2 years of power, he has not found time between battling the political fires of the middle-east and economic woes of neighbours to address what is, CLEARLY, a burning issue. "If he can't sort out the chocolate oranges, he's not going to sort out the train companies, the energy companies, the banks, is he?". In a wide-ranging interview, he was also asked about whether he would donate to a privately-funded Royal Yacht. He said "I give money to charity in different ways. There are obviously lots of deserving causes.", carefully neglecting to finish that with the sentence "And a new yacht for a woman who literally lives in a palace isn't one of them.". Very politically astute of him.<br /><br />Finally there has been a hubbub over RBS giving someone a bonus of £963,000. On top of his regular salary of £1.2 million. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I will do the job for a paltry £100,000 a year, and not ask for ANY bonus. And given that, due to the joys of shares, the £45.5 billion investment has now lost £27 billion under his reign, it's hard to imagine I could do a worse job. Consider this my formal application, RBS. I await your response with anticipation.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-78001181015085579312012-01-23T21:02:00.003+00:002012-01-23T22:37:52.095+00:00My Own Magdalen College Rejection LetterDear Magdalen College,<br /><br />I, like many other candidates who have not been accepted to your university, am writing pre-emptively to reject any offers you may put my way. I sincerely hope you understand that you were in competition with many other universities who have not accepted me, and I simply cannot accept all possible offers that are not yet put to me.<br /><br />I hope you find many other not-accepted candidates who are willing to attend your university in my stead.<br /><br />Yours Sincerely<br />Me.<br /><br />On a side note, I read the (actual) letter, and the final sentence is "Perhaps you should offer a glass of water in your interviews; it is rude to torture your guests". The use of torture there is bold, to say the least. One could suggest that real torture victims in Guantanamo might say they get arguably too much water during interviews. It's a fine line between "Satiating Thirst" and "Waterboarding", and frankly, if a college doesn't want to accidentally stray across that line, I can respect that.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-56502360298972253162012-01-16T22:40:00.000+00:002012-01-16T22:41:24.566+00:00Song Puns around Communist LeadersNew Music Update! Robbie Williams has released a new album of communist remixes of his old songs. "I'm loving Engels instead" is to be the title track. Also included is a brand new version of Fatboy Slim's seminal hit "Right here, Right Mao", advocating an immediate change to Maoism in Britain. Another twist on a new song with "Just the Che you are" remixed with the aid of Bruno Mars. And a change on the classic "Sparks" by Coldplay, called, you guessed it, "Marx". Say what you like about his music, you can't argue with the underlying political messages in his songs. Nothing in there for fans of Liebknecht, but it's hard to rhyme, I can't blame him really. THAT JUST HAPPENED. Get on board.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-74193139203005519622012-01-06T10:13:00.002+00:002012-01-07T00:45:13.834+00:00PowerlessnessDue to stormy conditions, we went without power for 3 whole days. I am going to relate to you that nightmarish existence. Do not read before bedtime, as this is clearly, a first-world horror story.<br /><br />DAY 1<br />Wake up without power. Think little of it, as I am going to a friend's house, and it'll surely be back on by the evening. Surely.<br /><br />Arrive back that evening. Enjoy a game of cards by candlelight. Novelty factor still making this a relatively enjoyable experience. Good analogy is a Christmas jumper. Wearing it once isn't bad. Midway through day three, though, with absolutely no choice in the matter, it begins to become a little grating. Go to bed. House not yet lost the warmth, but is noticeably colder than I would desire.<br /><br />DAY 2<br />Wake up. Curse the cold. Then curse the mind-numbing boredom. Suddenly understand the popularity of Victorian toys and sports, given that the alternative is "Freeze to death inside your own home reading ludicrously ambitious literature" (I had a stab at Dante's Inferno and very nearly learnt something before Scottish Power turned the electricity back on. What are you trying to pull, Scottish Power!? I don't want to LEARN on my time off. God.). Spent all day at home, tending to fires (Read: Not moving very far away from fires) reading books I'd always meant to get round to reading but never had. Nearly died from ennui. Had to eat something unexpectedly spicy just to liven up my day. Evening came. Played cards. Went to bed around 10, just because I needed something to do. Cold. So cold. Slept with a hot water bottle. In a sleeping bag. Under a duvet. Was acceptably warm. Scottish Power's emergency line said we'd have power by today. We did not.<br /><br />DAY 3<br />Wake up at dark o'clock. No idea what time it is, and my phone won't tell me as it is out of power. Decide to sleep until it's light outside. Get up. Ring Scottish Power's emergency line again. Shout "What are we to you, ANIMALS?! I need my electricity!". Moo down the line at the automated voice telling me it would now be midnight tomorrow till I got my power back. Begin to suspect cold and boredom may be messing with my mind. Spent all day trying to make a fire so hot it redefined the temperature scale as we know it, and everything would have to be designated in terms of this fire. This should just about stave off the cold. Sit within a four yard radius of the fire. Take up napping as a pastime. Boredom is physically palpable. At lunchtime, I try to learn piano. Twenty minutes later, I knew I was not cut out for the world of piano. Stare out of the window like a lonesome dog. Secretly hope UFOs land and take me away, just to end the crushing tedium. Night falls at about 4 pm. Wear a headtorch. This is my only fun. Play cards.<br /><br />DAY 4<br />Wake up to power. Shout "THANK THE LORD!" at the sight of the illuminating glow of the shaving light. Immediately upon having power again, I get offers to go do something that isn't sit at home alone the dark. C'est la vie.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-32132994112790993042011-12-30T00:29:00.001+00:002011-12-30T00:29:56.617+00:00"For Normal Hair"My shampoo has "For normal hair" written on it. This would normally be acceptable, but it sort of implies that there is such a thing as abnormal hair. I can imagine the scene now: Man walks into a chemists and says "Hi, I need some shampoo." and the woman behind the till gives him some, he looks at the packaging and goes "...Oh, no, this is for normal hair. I should have said really. My hair naturally assumes the shape of legendary English opening batsmen. Under my hat today I have Geoffrey Boycott playing a forward defensive. Yesterday it was Trescothick executing a magnificent square cut.", and the woman says "I'll see if we've got anything for that" and comes out holding a shampoo bottle that says "For hair that is NOT normal". I have a lot of time to think about these things in the bath. We also have something called Radox "Shower Therapy". I daren't use it lest I end up weeping on the floor shouting "Yes Dr Radox, I see it now, all my problems stem from my unrequited love in Primary 5! I need to let it go and be all the person I can be!". That's probably not what it does, but when it has such an ambiguous name I can never quite be certain, and why take that risk?idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-54248897805754119012011-12-27T01:32:00.003+00:002011-12-27T02:01:41.120+00:00JedwardJedward; We all know who they are, the cheeky, happy-go-lucky human equivalent of the puppy that occasionally runs into trees, and then has the temerity to look both confused and baffled by what is, to its simple mind, the sudden appearance of a 40 foot wooden pole from seemingly thin air. They are also, according to wikipedia "Proud possessors of hair so utterly magnetising it has drawn all 20% of a personality that they were born with, and sucked it directly to its magic follicles". It's fair to say that Jedward's hair is the best thing about them, which is a shame, because if you are outshone by your hair, you probably aren't very interesting. They are some sequiny clothes with hair. The only thing I could accurately tell you about them as people is that they are Irish, and so pale that, naked, they are invisible to the human eye in the Antarctic.<br /><br />But we must come to the crux of the matter. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say this: Jedward have literally ruined my life. You see, all my personal and professional accomplishments, admittedly scarce and minor, lie scattered by the wayside to their unending success. My achievements have been stripped of all meaning by the knowledge that, no matter how great I am in my chosen career, I will never be as well-known as Jedward, despite their bottomless well of talentlessness. To be outstripped by greats of our time, and cast aside as sand to the winds of eternity whilst they live on, rocks of brilliantness that generations from ours will look back on in awe and respect, that is a noble thing. But to imagine that in 100 years Jedward will be better remembered than Nobel prize-winners and other luminaries of our generation? Well, by contrast, what chance do I have against the might of their captivating hair?<br /><br />So why bother even trying to eclipse these gigantic planets of meaningless celebrity? My every action now is a futile gesture against their unending success in the face of millions and millions and millions of obstacles that should be holding them back. In a century they will be remembered and I shall not; in a millennium, we will all be forgotten, consigned to the books of history. They will impact more lives more heavily than I could ever hope to do. I could spend my every waking moment pursuing an impact on society as strong as theirs is, and never come anywhere near it.<br /><br />My experience tells me effort and talent bring success. Logic dictates that this should be so. Yet around Jedward, this worldview is a shattered illusion, a lie invented to explain reality in a way I can understand, and I have become painfully aware of this. My new outlook on life is that silly hair and ridiculous clothing brings unimaginable success. As such, I have bought hairgel and a sequin-covered floral nightgown. Wish me luck!idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-32685078423790993492011-12-20T13:41:00.003+00:002011-12-27T02:39:49.976+00:00Kim Jong-Very Ill.Well, it's been a bad year for dictators all round. North Korea is no exception, and now Kim Jong-Il has died of natural causes. The world mourns one of the greatest men of our times. Certainly, the world of golf is poorer for not having his ability to get 38-under par (11 holes in one) in it, but that is just one of many talents that the people of North Korea can no longer rely on. A prolific writer, it was said in his autobiography that he had written no fewer than 1,500 books whilst at university, but having mastered the art of prose, he turned his attention to alternative entertainment forms. He went on to write 6 operas, and became obsessed by film (Perhaps obsessed isn't quite strong enough to do justice for his love of film. He liked films so much he kidnapped a South Korean actor/director couple and made them make films until they absconded 8 years later), and apparently produced a 100-part series on the history of North Korea. In later life, having conquered everything that stood before him as a personal challenge, he had waterslides installed in his house, such that he may enjoy the relaxation of retirement. He leaves behind a legacy of an impoverished nation, cruelly misled by wild propaganda (He has reportedly convinced the people of North Korea that he can control the weather with his mood) and 5 children, one of whom will be the next to lead North Korea through another glorious 17 years of unending success.<br /><br />Christmas news, now! Eastenders beat Coronation Street in the famous "Battle of the Soaps" for the hearts and minds of people who are too drunk to care what's on TV, and slightly hate adverts. Well done! Of course, the Battle of the Soaps is a long tradition, started when, in 1999, Ross Kemp smashed Ken Barlow over the head with a champagne bottle at the Baftas, leading to a ratings explosion as people were desperate to see what these shows were about. Barlow and Kemp came to a gentleman's agreement: Whichever soap got most viewers on Christmas Day god a mug engraved with "King of the Soaps" given to it by the other soap, containing the ashes of a pump handle at the Rover's Return, after an infamous poem in Hello! magazine, in which a reader mourned the death of Coronation Street, and said the Ashes would head to London. Since 2003, the real Ashes have been kept safely locked away in the BBC archives, but a replica is given to the winning soap each year.<br /><br />Prince Philip has been ill, which has been bizarrely big news. The Sun went with "90 year old man in shock not-perfect condition horror!" while The Standard went with "Diana's Revenge: Philip in mortal threat after attack by Britain's best loved ghost!". Nobody seemed to consider an old man in not great condition a normal thing, somewhat irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, rather than a newsworthy headline story.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">AMERICAN ELECTION UPDATE</span><br />Since my last foray into writing about news, Hermain Cain has spectacularly imploded on the campaign trail for Republican nomination. Elections in America take about 30 years to complete (We're still not sure who won in 2000) so ignore the fact that a man can collapse in the election nearly a year before the vote, and focus on the brilliant things he has brought to us, including quoting the Pokemon song as something to inspire us, his flat-rate 9% tax on absolutely everything (Pointed out later to be pretty similar to SimCity) and, of course, the sex scandals. The man is single-handedly trying to capture every headline bulletin in the news at 10. He was the fore-runner before the trifling matter of him being almost catastrophically bad forced him to retire, leaving the way clear for Newt Gingrich, according to political pundits. Initially, what sort of name is "Newt"? Secondly, and perhaps more pressingly, the man is a known-philanderer and took a $1.6 million payment for doing nothing for a company (Smells a LITTLE like bribery). I shall repeat; He is the <span style="font-weight: bold;">forerunner</span>. His challengers have fallen by the wayside due to being crazy (Bachmann) then slightly less crazy, but quite stupid (Perry), being Herman Cain, with all the accompanying disasters (Cain) and worst of all "Being Mitt Romney" (Romney). Romney is realistically, the last hope of sanity in a Republican election that isn't so much littered with madness as a landfill of crazy. He is plagued by the issues of "Being a former Democrat", and "Being so wildly and unimaginably rich that all reasonable voters should find him utterly unelectable". But of course, these are republicans. There are two final candidates, the fringe Jon Huntsman, who has the worst thing possible: Good international experience due to being ambassador to China. And Ron Paul. Who is admirable in his consistency and desire to see through his libertarian ideals despite the fact states' rights went out the window as a concept sometime around 1865. He would gladly see Federal government vanish and states take precedence. His foreign policy is isolationist (Rather than invasionist). What's worst is not that his policies are dangerously bad, but rather more that they are so removed from the standard political process that people are deeply, DEEPLY disenfranchised (9% approval rating for Congress. Hitler probably ranked higher in 1940s West Europe than that) with that he may actually do quite well electorally.<br /><br />That is your news. Fin.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-11724593091315293082011-12-13T14:41:00.005+00:002011-12-13T15:12:17.128+00:00Short Things That Are Difficult To Flesh OutIn the case of another cold winter, I have written to the BBC politely asking that News 24 and, indeed, the red button services, be dedicated to live footage and highlights of particularly slippy areas in built-up city centres. Not only is this more interesting than actual news, there could be a wonderful, post-Queen's Speech 2 hour special featuring the best falls from around the nation, for elderly relatives to fall asleep to on Christmas Day. I encourage you to do the same. Actually, scrap that idea: I've had a similar but better one: Winterwatch, like Springwatch, Bill Oddie and Kate Humble go round, set up some cameras in a town in Leicestershire or whatever, and then we get a daily round up of the best bits. I can imagine Bill going "This little old biddy is going to the shops for some cat food, we've tracked her with our cameras for several minutes now... and she's over! That was a good one! Look, she's lost her hat! Haha!" or "This young chap's nipped out for a pack of fags, but he's not properly prepared... Look out for that lamppost.".<br /><br />Things that are fun: Trying to make a virtual pro in Fifa look like Nicholas Lyndhurst. I've also got a Gaddafi lookalike for "Dictators' Eleven", the safe hands of Mao in goals, Stalin organising the defensive line, Pol Pot bombing up and down the (very) left wing, Hitler out on the far right. Fidel "Goal Machine" Castro up front, sharing the line with "the Italian Steamtrain", Mussolini. General Franco at left back, with Idi Amin playing that crucial holding midfielder role. Bashar Al-Assad, creative with excuses for atrocities, creative with through balls. Attacking midfielder. Gaddafi at right back. Saddam Hussein playing centre back. Good side. Very much a side looking for world domination.<br /><br />I went to McDonalds. Whilst there, the people behind me said "I'm going to drink my milkshake first." I thought "What a tedious anecdote.". It was difficult not to turn round and go "Christ, you should tell that story at parties" (I can be rather sarcastic if I'm in a bad mood). Of course, I then texted this whole terrifyingly dull anecdote to a friend. The irony was not lost on me. And now I'm telling all of you. The cycle of tediousness is complete.<br /><br />Somehow, I have managed to procure a pair of socks that are uncomfortable. These feel like they've been designed for cloven-hooved mammals rather than a human. I don't know how it's possible to screw up socks, but the designers of these monstrosities have boldly succeeded in this ambition. Rubbish socks. Bah.<br /><br />I've started hiccuping like my dad. It's a hiccup I've heard absolutely no-one else ever do. I'm pretty sure I've got some sort of genetic hiccup defect. It sounds like the noise I'd imagine a hippo to make when it comes up for air.<br /><br />My mum has taken to playing her friends at scrabble online. Both of them will use Scrabble cheating software, to the point where it might as well be robot A v robot B. The fun bit is trying to justify the words. "Oh, glasnost? I was just thinking about the Soviet Republics under Gorbachev, and I glanced at my letters, and there it was: The period of maximum openness preceding the fall of communism. That's a bonus fifty for using all my letters", "Kakemono? It's a Japanese wall-hanging. Isn't that common knowledge?", "Ranarium? It's where I used to breed all my frogs as a kid." etc, etc.<br /><br />I like it when emails say "Please find attached". It lends an element of desperation, as if the person sending the email is sitting going "Oh my god, oh my god, is it working? I really hope this works. This is a vital email. PLEASE attach!" at their screen. And yet, even now, I still do it, just on the off-chance that the recipient of my email finds it as inherently funny as I do.<br /><br />I used to have a sweet holder with Hassan Nasrallah's face on it. I did always like my Pezbollah dispenser.<br /><br />There you are. Those were things I liked initially, then quickly went off, until it got to the point that I couldn't be bothered fleshing them out properly to justify them as their own blog post so they are all lumped together. Think of this like the bits I cut out of regular blog postings. And a pun about a Lebanese political group. Everything you'd love to read, I'm sure. Enjoyed it? Great!idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-45073831842804480942011-12-11T02:46:00.002+00:002011-12-11T03:30:49.830+00:00Lenin's SchooldaysRecently I have found myself pondering the bigger questions in life: "Which of my hands do I prefer?" (The left, I find the vein pattern more aesthetically pleasing), "Name all post-war prime ministers who have 4 syllable names?" (Answer: Clement Attlee, Winston Churchill and Harold Wilson (Will also accept Anthony Eden, provided you call him "Tony", similarly Tony Blair provided you call him "Anthony")) and, most importantly "What would Lenin's schooldays have been like?".<br /><br />Initially, I imagine he'd have come into school full of hope and idealism. He would arrive, and find that the class began with 2 pupils owning 85% of the pencils, and the other 24 having make do with 6 pencils between them. Immediately struck by the unfairness of this system, he would organise the 24 pupils into a workers' collective, and overthrow the traditional hierarchy of the classroom, demanding pencils for all. He would then get the most violent children in the classroom and form them into a small group designed to suppress the students, and demand that the teacher become little more than a propaganda wing, spouting his rhetoric directly into the proletariat whilst pretending to be an unbiased figure of authority.<br /><br />Ultimately several of the other students would try to have Lenin wedgied, but those who opposed him would face a fierce and unknowable group that would silently stalk them and ultimately, wedgie them in retaliation. These would be some of the darkest days for freedom in Lenin's classroom until classmate Stalin took over, when they would seem like positively ebullient days of happiness and joy by contrast.<br /><br />He would collapse the workers' essay-producing capabilities by paying them a pittance for their harvest of essays (which would obviously force them to give less to the collective and sell their essays on the black market in order to make ends meet), leading to a communal essay-famine that would leave people having to drop out of the class for not getting enough essays. This would be whilst he was fighting an interclass war with 2C, trying to get them to adopt his policy on pencil-sharing despite their own ambitions for the spread of pencils throughout their class, but this was ultimately part of his ideal; to have the whole school share pencils evenly. He would rebuild essay-writing capabilities with the New Essay Policy (NEP), but little Joseph would scuttle that when he came to power.<br /><br />Ultimately, he would find it hard to deal with the political and economic realities of communal pencil ownership (and, indeed, the bureaucratic overhead demanded to ensure that pencils were truly shared amongst the students) and, compared to the old system, his idealistic yet almost hopelessly naive system would seem both cumbersome and complex. He would eventually leave the school, passing the baton of a system that could have worked to Stalin in 3P, but Stalin would ultimately damage this pencil-sharing collective irreparably, leading to it falling apart under Mikhail Gorbachev, the last student to lead the collective, and the only leader not in school when the collective was first formed, who would then smash the system, and allow the school to use whatever pencil-dispensation method it wanted. (There you are: Fun fact about communism in Russia, it really was a single-generational thing. Gorbachev was the only leader who was born into Communism, all the others were born pre-1917).<br /><br />Ultimately this is analogy that breaks down in multiple areas, such as portraying assassination attempts through the medium of wedgies, portraying a devastating famine as some sort of dearth of essays, and is let down my general lack of knowledge about the communist era in Russia. However, like many of the world's best politicians, I do not let trifling facts stifle what I find a fundamentally agreeable idea, and so I present this to you. If you wish, you may put it on the BBC as "Little Lenin", and try to use it to teach kids 20th century history (Arguably, you should get an ACTUAL historian in to fact-check, rather than rely on quickly read Wikipedia articles and my loose understanding of Animal Farm). At worst, it is equal with Byker Grove, and significantly more enriching. Consider it!idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-45309690656509813382011-12-09T18:37:00.002+00:002011-12-09T18:45:56.591+00:00Accidental RacismI was doing what I always do while walking along the street, that is, obviously, rate my top 5 Popes (JP2, St Peter, St Leo, Pope-ELECT Stephen (The pope that never was) and Gregory the XII (For resigning), since you're wondering. I would include Boniface, but that's less of a name, more of a Scottish compliment). Anyways, I was so distracted, I accidentally bumped into someone while walking home. It would have been fine if I'd just done my usual thing of mumbling "Sorry", but I said loudly and confidently "I didn't see you in the dark!". This would also have been fine, but for the fact he was black. I was accidentally racist. I couldn't face saying another word in case I inadvertently lynched him, so I just left in awkward silence while he presumably thought "What the hell just happened?!". I am terrifyingly awkward at times.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-8092142835944757002011-12-07T22:43:00.003+00:002011-12-07T23:17:23.104+00:00Predictive TextI have predictive text turned on on my phone. Not for any reasons of usability or speed, but in equal measure: Because I'm already used to it, and secondly, because it means I occasionally get that joyous thrill of having to insert a word the phone doesn't know. It's the biggest confidence boost you're likely to unexpectedly receive in your day to day life. "Oh, hallo!" you think (That makes it seem a little camper than it is) "The phone doesn't know this word. Logically, the fact that I have to put it in means I am using a rare word, and rarity inherently implies coolness when it comes to words.". I'm sat there typing in "satiate" thinking I'm the cleverest man ever to hold a Nokia 6303. The downside to this is once you've added a word, it stays added. This means you have to think up more and more obscure ways to describe things just to get that rush of adding a word. "How far away are you?" "About 200 cubits", for example, or desperately shoehorning the word "Gregarious" into conversation. Describing something as egregious just to type it into the phone. It's a slippery slope.<br /><br />But these unexpected confidence boosts come at a price. My phone automatically places "Riot" before "Pint". I'm secretly convinced this is the reason for the London riots. Someone with a Nokia texted a friend saying "Fancy coming out for a riot? Bring along your mates." and it all got out of hand. I hope Nokia is happy with this system.<br /><br />My phone will occasionally trick me, by looking like it's typing one word, then at the last letter, freaking out and switching to a totally different word. "A" "An" "Bon" "Boop" "Compr" "Conspi" "Conspir". When I type the last letter, I assume it'll go from "Conspir" to "Conspire". But it doesn't. It goes to "Comprise". Which leads to sentences in my texts like "I'll somehow comprise to die of exposure in a crowded town centre" (Jokes about me dying of exposure; just imagine the lucky people who actually who receive these texts, it's a rollercoaster of joy with me), which clearly makes no sense, and renders a somewhat amusing sentiment meaningless.<br /><br />I also typed "Birmingham" (For reasons best left unknown: Perhaps I was amusing some other lucky friend of mine with a fact about canals) and accidentally typed and an extra "O" on the end. This gives you the new word "Birminghano", which I'm pretty certain is a spice deliberately made to taste like despair. I like that it clearly has a system for trying to logically guess the word though. But when I put "ed" after "Compris" you get "comprised". However, it'll allow you to keep doing this for 12 "ed"s and an e, before it goes "I don't recognise that word". Oh, you recognise comprisedededededededededededede, but comprisededededededededededededed would just be CHAOS? In the interest of science/boredom (The building block of all human advancement is boredom) I pressed a single button (Yes, my phone isn't touchscreen. I like the tactile sensation of a button, and I don't need my phone to get my emails) until it stopped giving me a suggestion just to see how long the word I could get was. Answer? "Tuvuttutuvutuvutuvutuvutuvutuvut". Rolls off the tongue.<br /><br />That is my opinion on my phone's predictive text. I like it.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-40671649330410117622011-12-07T15:17:00.007+00:002011-12-15T22:28:04.160+00:00A Syriad of Human Rights Abuses / It's Assad State of Affairs in SyriaSyrian leader Bashar Al-Assad (I've said it before and I'll say it again, he's a poor man's Basil Fawlty, especially given that he runs Syria in roughly the same manner as I would imagine Basil would) has been on the news lately to dispel the rumours that 4000 Syrians had died. He said "No government in the world kill its people unless it's lead by a crazy person", which, on the face of it, is little more than a curious admission of insanity. This would explain his next statement of "Who said the UN is a credible institution?". It's almost like he's pre-emptively preparing his "Insanity" plea for the Hague. "Yeah, well, I AM crazy. Only a crazy person would go on TV and say that someone in his position must be crazy". Apparently the 4000 dead people are all just unlucky victims of rogue officers (That's his defence) who are over-zealous. One dead person, I could understand. Hell, even a dozen could be reasonably ascribed to bad luck. But 4000 seems a stretch too far for that logic, reasonably.<br /><br />In other Dictator-that-won't-admit-it news, Vladimir Putin has been under scrutiny after protests against the ever-so-slightly rigged elections. He's blasted his critics with a 4 and a half hour question and answer session. According to his spokesperson, Putin might "reinvent himself and show the world Putin mark 2". This does not surprise me, as he is actually a robot built by the Kremlin. He will, actually, literally reinvent himself and build Putin Mark 2. Election officials at the Kremlin are probably shouting "Gentlemen! We can rebuild him! We have the technology! We have the capability to build the world's first bionic politician! Better than he was before!". Vladimir Putin is the 6 billion ruble man. This four and half hour question session was his longest ever. As if you need any more evidence that he's an improved robot.<br /><br />Apparently, Japan has utilised some of the funds allocated to recovery after the tsunami to whaling. I suppose it makes sense. Where did the tsunami come from? The sea. Where do whales live? The sea. It's all adding up here against the whales. I'm personally inclined to call this rather more of a police investigation than a hunting trip. There's no accusations yet, but if those whales have nothing to hide, then they have nothing to fear. Except being harpooned, dragged onto land, and cut into bits, then sold to the public, all in the name of scientific research ("Which sauce goes best with whale flesh: A study" is due out any time now). I guess that is a legitimate whale-concern.<br /><br />Economy news (The whole catastrophic meltdown thing has rather dragged on), and the IMF has decided to wade in and spread a bit of Christmas cheer! Hooray! What sort of good news do they have for us? Oh. The economic outlook is "Gloomy". Brilliant. Well, thanks for that. Apparently George Osborne has been VERY good this year, and he's sent a letter to Santa asking him if he could have a stronger economy for Christmas this year. Press reports describe him as "Hopeful but not expectant" and he also stressed just how good he was, saying "I haven't taken any cocaine with any hookers this year, unlike 1993" and giving an enthusiastic double thumbs-up. We should be out of the woods by New Years, I expect.<br /><br />Weather news! Apparently, we should be prepared for snow! In winter of all times! How absurd. I was expecting 23 degree heat and glorious sunshine. Thank god the forecasters warned me, I'll have to cancel the golf game I'd scheduled for December 21st. Seriously. It's winter. It's not a cataclysmic, world-ending snow. It's as devilishly high as 4 inches in some places, apparently. Will the nation cope with this positive ice age? It's hard to tell at this early stage.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Made Up News</span> makes a welcome return (He says, optimistically), with the news this week that David Cameron and fellow Cabinet minister George Osborne are to release a rap CD about the economy. Cameron, or as he wishes to be known now, Davey C, said to the press "One really mustn't come across as a fuddy-duddy to the electorate", before Georgie O leapt in with "Yes, and it's about the economy, so it's an educational tool more than anything". One track, "Mao Money, Mao Problems" focuses on the growing Chinese market, their strict control over their currency's value, and the effect this has had on worldwide markets. Backed by "M.C. NC" Nick Clegg, the trio hope to be more successful than Parliament's previous efforts into rap (in which Tony Blair, Tony Benn, and Tony Baldry formed "Tony! Tony! Tony!", with 1996's must-have album "Members of the House of Music"), and are aiming for chart success with "Country-House Grammar". The first single "Boom Boom Pow", a look at the driving forces of a strong military in supporting a good economy, is out on December 19th and is hoping for the Christmas number one spot.<br /><br />This policy is similar to Thatcher's desire to be seen as "in touch", in which she, Geoffrey Howe, John Major and Nigel Lawson released a 3 hour prog-rock concept double-album called "Troubles" about Northern Ireland. The album was released under the band name "Iron Lady", and was followed up by the 1982 foreign policy concept "Argy Bargy", and their third and final album 1989's "Minor Miner Kerfuffle", a 75 minute single-track tape. The group split up when Nigel Lawson left to form Leftfield in 1990, with whom he still tours to this day.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">And Finally </span>(This is a new section that's not about the news, and is instead, just about my life): I heard "Friday" by Rebecca Black on Radio 4. Everything I thought I knew about the world, a relatively minor amount, has been disregarded in light of this evidence. The previously unthinkable is now, by contrast, eminently thinkable. If this can happen, what next? Monkeys learn to talk, the sun darkens and endless night falls across an uncaring Earth, the Conservatives win a majority in Scotland? I JUST DON'T KNOW ANYMORE.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-22120472672209643542011-12-06T01:55:00.004+00:002011-12-06T02:55:50.886+00:00No Need to Go Russian Into Anything...Russian election news tops the headlines today! According to some of the press, the Russian political system might be a teensy-weensy, itsy-bitsy, infinitesimally small bit corrupt. Hardly worth worrying about really. Chechnya, ruled by what some pesky fools would call a "Warlord", who promised 100% of his people would vote for Putin, had a 99.5% turnout, of which, generously, 99.48% of the vote was to Putin. It's quite one thing for a despotic maniac to promise 100% of his citizens will vote for someone, it's quite another to very nearly pull that figure off. Some tedious allegations of electoral fraud came up. Russian TV indicated turnouts of 146% in some places, but in Russia, like Zimbabwe, dead people retain the right to vote, so we can't really find it too surprising that turnout was so high. Also some ballot boxes arrived ready filled, but the deliverers probably just saw some youths and wanted to save them the inconvenience of actually going to the polling station, so let them vote there. Also, apparently some pens used invisible ink, probably just a practical joke by notorious japester Vlad "The Lad" Putin. Also, one person filmed an election officer filling in votes at his desk, but I'm pretty certain his opinion counts the same as about a thousand of the proles. Also, apparently some voters were bussed to several polling stations to vote repeatedly. But these are just a couple of minor indiscretions that every election has. To claim that there is systemic abuse just because of repeated and widespread examples of it is just foolish.<br /><br />Next up, Khmer Rouge go to trial! Not Pol Pot (Figurehead of the group) given that he is dead (A difficulty for any modern day trial), but fortunately, his sidekicks are all there! Today, one said that they "were not bad people". Now, if you ever find yourself in a scenario where you say that, it does undermine your case, and maybe I'm just being picky here, it's probably just me over-analysing, but it does weaken your position of not being bad people, if you are saying that whilst on trial for genocide. I generally like to think of myself as "Not a bad person", and yet, somehow, I don't have two million dead Cambodians to explain from two years of appalling leadership. The figures just don't quite add up. I can count on 0 hands the number of times I've been on trial for genocide.<br /><br />Chaos reigned in Britain for a day. It was so mad, I went to the library to hand back some books, and when I got there, it was CLOSED. Anarchy in the UK, The Sex Pistols have never sounded so right. This was a momentous turnout of a third of public sector workers on strike over pensions, which was hugely eclipsed by the biggest news story of the day: Professionally offensive man Jeremy Clarkson said something offensive. I think they were going to lead with "Footballer plays football" before this other story fell into their laps, and they couldn't turn it down. The media exploded over this, despite the fact that it was an ill-judged (and bad) joke. Curiously, though, for one of the first times ever, they managed not to be the biggest over-reactors in this scenario, with Unison angrily comparing him to Gaddafi (Pro-tip: Your argument loses validity when you compare people involved to dead dictators. Just a memo for next time) and demanding he be reported to the police (For a bad joke. What were they going to do, take away his license to lampoon?). Extraordinary.<br /><br />Finally, onto a mildly silly story now. <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-16030931">This</a> story isn't in itself amusing, but if you look closely at the copy of FHM India's cover, you'll note that, apparently what sells lad's mags in India like hot potatoes is "7 TIPS TO ACE SNOOKER". Part of me secretly wishes British magazines had more snooker tips as cover stories. The other part of me is amused at how antiquated the concept seems. It's like a 19th century lad's mag in the UK. I wouldn't be surprised if you open it up, and there's tips on how to maintain your beard, naughty pictures of a lady's exposed ankles, and "Stories from the Frontline: My Crimean Experience" by Lord Cardigan*, with some poetry by Tennyson (He seems like a maverick poet. I bet he'd be up for it). I actually want this to exist now. It could have a section on John Wisden, "Bowler of the Century?", for his performance in the season as leading wicket-taker with 106 wickets. Perhaps a segment about the "New-fangled football: Will it catch on?". It'd be lovely. If I was born 160 years earlier, and rich, this would have happened.<br /><br />*You don't need me to tell you that Cardigan was the leader of the Charge of the Light Brigade, so his experience would largely be "Got my men massacred", but to be honest, I imagine that'd be the case for most British army officers throughout the 19th century, so he's as good as any. Tennyson also wrote "Charge of the Light Brigade", the poem about the tragedy. This was a deliberate inclusion by me, but I'm putting these two facts down here so as to ensure that you can see they interweave nicely, and thus assume this is a real, December 1854 edition of whatever this magazine may be called. Perhaps "Victorian Gentleman". I've not really thought this through totally.<br /><br />Anyways, that last bit clearly isn't news. But it's news-inspired. Good enough for me. That's enough. We're done here.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-58361667457845496062011-12-04T14:47:00.002+00:002011-12-04T14:57:22.824+00:00Social ButterflyThe expression "Social Butterfly" is one of those rare things: A metaphor in which the true meaning is obfuscated by its use. At first glance you'd think "Well, someone who is a social smoker is someone who only smokes around other smokers, so a social butterfly must be a person who briefly turns into a butterfly when around others who have undergone a similar transmogrification", and I applaud you for your ruthless application of logic, but since this is a metaphor, we can throw that out of the window.<br /><br />No, "Social Butterfly" is an analogy for someone who is gregarious, and socially-adept. And as we all know, no creature better personifies the affable nature of these people than the notoriously chatty butterfly, so it really is an ideal fit for this role. Can you imagine how silly you'd sound if you described someone as, say, an "Amiable Giraffe" (The giraffe, of course, being well-regarded of his stand-offish nature and well-guarded private life)? Such nonsense could surely not be tolerated in the English language. <br /><br />I, for one, am not a social butterfly. I am, at best, an awkward moth. I am trying to popularise that as the opposite of a social butterfly.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-56048719918386964792011-11-29T22:19:00.003+00:002011-11-29T22:40:09.762+00:00ShreddiesI've recently become an addict of cereal again. In particular, Shreddies. Here is the typical process for eating Shreddies:<br /><br />Bleary-eyed, I get up, get the milk out of the fridge, come back, get a shower (If you're wondering why I do it in this order, it's because it seems that nudity isn't wildly popular as a habit in my flat. I could joke I have learnt that the hard way, but I don't want you to get the wrong impression, so just assume I divined it using careful application of my knowledge of social norms) and then hop out of the shower, feeling fresh. Then I pop on my towelled dressing-gown (I'm a man of ostentatious opulence, I cannot deny my desire for the finer things in life) and sit in it, whilst pouring my Shreddies, then my milk. This is where things start to go wrong. I cannot get the milk level right. Get the right amount for the end to still be crisp, and my first few mouthfuls are like shovelling dry weetabix into my face. Get the right amount of milk for the first few mouthfuls to be nice, and by the end of the bowl, I've ended up with some sort of wheaty pulp, like cold Shreddie-porridge. Once I've decided which of these two outcomes seems least unappealing, I pour and consume. "Delicious", I think. I then pop the bowl to the side, and go about my day (For the purposes of time, and to save you from the tedium of my actual life, feel free to imagine I'm a Soviet spy, and I spend all day trying to gather information on top level government ministers).<br /><br />Then I arrive back, and look at that bowl and think "Tsk". But if my other bowl is beside it (I'm a two-bowl man. One must make cutbacks in crockery in order to afford towelled dressing-gowns) then I usually go "Oh. Bollocks", because this means I have to wash up. And something that always escapes me after I eat a bowl of Shreddies is that, as we all know, Shreddies + Milk + Time = Superglue, in fact, it is the strongest glue known to man, and is used in the construction of major structures instead of relatively weak alternatives, like rivets or welding. I swear, I'm relatively certain the Shreddie remains have chemically fused themselves to the bowl on some sort of atomic level. I might as well try to clean the carbon out of steel with soapy warm water. I have to dig out my jack-hammer to get these tiny pieces off. 40 minutes later, I've finally cleaned my bowls with a combination of power-washers and a small army of trained bowl cleaners.<br /><br />Then I go to bed and look forward to the whole cycle the next. Shreddies: The bane of my life.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-3166261810900453792011-11-29T19:23:00.003+00:002011-11-29T19:35:55.136+00:00Surprise Jazz!I think we, as a society, have taken jazz as far as creative licence allows us whilst sticking to the regimented and frankly old-fashioned system of having people attend shows in order to see it. It's why it gives me great pleasure to unleash the artistically-valid yet somewhat whimsical notion of "Surprise Jazz" upon the nation. Jazz is limited by the expectation that jazz will happen, and I enjoy the concept of unpredictable jazz. Consider it a live version of jazz unexpectedly coming up in "Shuffle" mode on your personal choice of media player.<br /><br />Basically, across the country, small jazz groups (Quartets or quintets, maximum) carefully attire themselves in bush camouflage, and hide, unseen, behind benches in the park. Perhaps a couple of old ladies sit down to feed ducks and discuss their grandsons, and, I dunno, the latest advancements in blue-rinse technology, I don't know what little old ladies in the park talk about. Anyways, it's at this moment that the Surprise Jazz quintet strike, leaping from the bushes and playing an assortment of jazz classics (I'd open with Dave Brubeck's Take Five) to the delighted nans. They'll talk about it for weeks. "We were sitting in the park, discussing cardigan prices, when, suddenly, jazz!". You will not only brighten their day, but I'd dare say make their week. The unexpected element of the jazz will only heighten their joyous delight.<br /><br />I've taken the liberty of making up several reviews from mainstream papers, this is what they might have to say about this concept:<br /><br />"Bigger and more artistically daring than the early punk movement" - The Times<br />"Unprecedented artistic freedom playing to an unsuspecting audience gives the quartet whole new directions in which to take jazz that were previously closed to mainstream forms" - The Independent<br />"Immigrant music ruining our parks!" - The Daily Mail<br />"Conceptually brave, smashing the cultural conventions that jazz belongs in jazz clubs, this new medium opens up a whole new world to jazz, one which deserves to be fully utilised by modern jazz musicians and fans alike" - The Guardianidlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-17239553050129676452011-11-29T18:47:00.002+00:002011-11-29T19:19:14.227+00:00SamplingSampling is the process of taking part of one song and slamming it into your song. It's considered fine to be done. Inspired by the fact that Leona Lewis has sampled Penguin Cafe Orchestra, and ruined one of my favourite songs, I think it's fair to call it "Theft". If I "sample" someone else's essay, suddenly I'm hauled up on charges of plagiarism. <br /><br />It strikes of a creativity-impairment. "I can't think of my own melody.. I'll just take this one from another song". Usually a song so old that it's no longer really recognisable. Do you think MC Hammer wrote the riff for "U Can't Touch This"? You're wrong, it's from 1981's Super Freak, by Rick James. He had to sue to get some of the credit he deserved for basically writing the song. I was once listening to Talk by Coldplay, when my dad overheard it and went "Why are you listening to Kraftwerk?". I was pretty certain I wasn't. Turns out I was wrong, I was listening to the main riff from Computer Love. He dug out a tape to show me this. I'd have had no idea if he hadn't have told me, there was no indication in the song that they basically used Kraftwerk's song and added some other words. At least, according to Wikipedia, they received permission to use it.<br /><br />In any other industry if you "sampled" a colleague's piece, it'd be rightly criticised for outright theft, or at best, unacknowledged borrowing. You wouldn't have a comedian use other comedian's jokes without ever mentioning it. You wouldn't have a journalist lift 200 words from an old column someone else wrote. You wouldn't get seemingly endless repeats of old TV shows pretending to be new content(Oh wait, sorry BBC, I forgot. Zing. Don't think I didn't see you play Yellowstone on BBC Four, then move it to BBC Two this year. If I watched it then, I don't want to watch it again. If I didn't watch it then, it's because I didn't want to watch it. Unless the BBC assumes I just watch documentaries by accident and assumes it has to put them in the place I'm most likely to trip over them).<br /><br />I wouldn't have recognised Leona Lewis as having thieved Penguin Cafe Orchestra if I didn't already know and like the original song, which is slightly obscure. I'd have thought "My, Leona Lewis knows how to write a good song! That does surprise me.", but instead I'm thinking "My, Leona Lewis knows how to ruin a good song! That doesn't surprise me.". I had to listen to the song (Pity me) to find out it's just the main riff from Perpetuum Mobile (Released in 1987), repeated, over a thudding, jarring drum beat (Not in the original song because it ruins it), with some singing over the top. And occasionally an aggressively annoying bass line. Enjoy.idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467003453136131233.post-47395123555963032862011-11-29T16:11:00.005+00:002011-11-29T16:50:34.391+00:00Wallpapering LeaguesWallpapering league. Like football league, but for wallpapering. “Oh my God, you see the way he did that corner?! Right on the seam! Unbelievable". Kids wallpapering in the streets. Mums saying "Tim! How many times have I told you not to wallpaper in the hall?!" Lads down pubs, saying "What do you think of the new Melchester lad?" "Struggles a bit on fiddly banisters, but he's got potential. Good work on the open walls, really knows his way around a standard corner."<br /><br />You'd get some classic commentary from decorating league icons Handy Andy and Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen on Sky Sports:<br />"What do you think of the Brighton laddering formation?"<br />"Risky strategy, but it's a bold one. you wouldn't expect to see a double ladder plan this early on in the papering, but it gives them an advantage if it's executed well.... Oh and that one's come straight from the training stairwell! Brilliantly done!"<br />"Oh, and look at that, he's got paste on the skirting! He'll have to clear that up, he won't be happy with that. And you can see the manager's livid on the sidelines! Unbelievable! A man of his wallpapering calibre making such a simple mistake! Is he losing it? Oh, he's tried to fold an embossed roll! It's all going wrong here for Brighton!"<br /><br />Offices would arrange fantasy pasting leagues, chatting to each other about that weekend's results."I can't believe the Doncaster Decorators beat the Tyneside Trimmers! Everyone thought that the Decorators would go down this year!", picking their favourite players and saying to each other "Picking the Dutch Master Van der Stroom for an away tie on a fiddly stairwell? What were you thinking!?".<br /><br />I've just picked up the advertising pamphlet for EA Sports Wallpapering 2012, which promises all the biggest name stars from the English Wallpapering Premiership, the Italian Lega Tappezzeria, the German Tapeteliga and the Scottish Decorating Division 1. It also promises a whole new method and dynamic as you control your multi-millionaire decorators against some of the biggest wallpapering sides in Europe, and manage your team to the very highest level. With a whole new pasting-table mechanic that promises to deliver more realistic coverage of paste, and additional brush coverage controls, this is the best Wallpapering simulator ever! Create your own character and work your way up from reserve side at your favourite club, say, the Preston Pasters, or the Wigan Wallpaperers, to become the best decorator in Europe. And an all-new Manager mode that allows you to train your decorators in your own, specially designed hallway set-pieces makes sure this is an unmissable addition to any wallpapering fan's game collection!idlemusingshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13393203180411109624noreply@blogger.com0