the neverending story

the third prime ministerial debate. is it me, or has the whole thing turned into much more of a joke than initially expected?

splash

summer is coming.

the men who stare at goats

me and the troubadour are writing a show for the edinburgh fringe festival this year. here's the website:

there's not really anything on it at the moment, but there are a load of links so you can follow our progress. like on twitter or facebook or something.

and this is what it's all about. we think.

It’s the big meeting and Andrew is lumbered with the key presentation on Corporate Strategy. He’s unsure what that is.
He isn’t too worried though: he’s a PowerPoint wizard, he can make words jump through hoops (as long as he has some Clip-Art of hoops). He’s in complete control.
Except PowerPoint has inconveniently achieved sentience and is planning to kill him and take over the world.

In a death struggle with his homicidal slides, the four bullet points of the Apocalypse and quadspeed forces of evil; now Andrew might be humanity’s last hope of salvation.
Death by PowerPoint? Next slide please.

iron man 2

i'm in this show tonight.

the toughest impro challenge in the world!
12 actors start. they do impro. audience vote some off.
one actor survives 'til the end.
they become - IRON ACTOR!

london impro never got better.
or tougher.

the show will also have these fine performers (obviously they won't win as I AM IRON ACTOR. but they'll at least help me look good):
Chris Mead - The Ministry, The Oodcast, Andrew & The Slides of Chaos
Rhiannon Vivian - Cannonball, Crouching Unicorn, Hidden Goblin
Claire O'Callaghan - Cannonball
Andrew Gentilli - Cannonball
Michael Brunstrom - Curt Hatred's Copper Glove
Wanda Keenan - A whole bunch of stuff, including this
Roderick Millar - Friendly Fire
Paul Rice - Sketchprov
Matt Andrews - Hoopla!
Geoff Marshall - Cameron Girl
Katrina Johnsen - Hoopla!

doors 7.30pm, show 8pm
upstairs at The Black Horse, 6 rathbone place, london, w1t 1hh

see you there for kick-ass good entertainment and laugh-a-moment genius machinery.

date night

you like laughing, right?

it'll be like a rock-badger playing Van Halen records. you wouldn't want to miss it.

The Ministry and Hoopla! unite for the first time ever. hear us roar.

*****starring*****

Nicola "haystacks" Kidner
Jinni "scrumpy jack" Lyons
Edgar "lollypop" Fernando
Chris "drum stick" Mead
Jonathan "kevin" Monkhouse

all expertly and ceremoniously directed by:
Stephen "carrot top" Roe

***** ***** *****
Date:
Tuesday, 18 May 2010
Time:
20:00 - 22:00
Location:
Upstairs at The Black Horse, 6 Rathbone Place, London, W1T 1HH

***** ***** *****

Generated by MapGenerator.co.uk

bride wars

highlights of the second televised debate. it was broadcast by sky news, so there will probably an advertisement for something you don't need at the beginning.

the benchwarmers

here's the first parliamentary debate between the 3 leaders of the main parties.
absolutely no surprise to find that it's just petty squabbling between gordon brown and david cameron, both who are far more concerned with trying to undermine each other than actual politics. it's like a playground, with two bullies scrapping to make sure everyone knows which one is the biggest and bestest, ignoring any rules of engagement and weirdly agreeing with each other on most points, despite presenting themselves as opposites.

to one side of the fight, a quiet little chap is there trying to prevent all the onlookers getting laid out by a stray fist.

"the more they attack each other, the more they start to sound the same."

hmm.

unfortunately it was televised by ITV, so it's a pretty vulgar presentation, that probably didn't help with the WWF smackdown atmosphere.

the land before time

i am old now, but not as old as this amazing film made in 1927:

planet of the apes

it's my birthday today. so i thought i'd collate today's releases from some of my favourite online comics (well, you couldn't get more geeky than that):











click on any of them, and you'll be transported by magic to the website.

it's my party (and i'll cry if i want to)

i have been getting all political of late. in my slightly liberal job, where i get to watch BBC News 24 as much as i want (normally i watch children's TV but this politics thingy seems to be holding my attention for now), i have made time to watch as many Party Manifesto press conferences as possible.

my take is this:

Labour Party: pretty dull and uninspiring. made me phase out of my own head.
the cartoons are a partly weird, and mostly patronising. it's pretty hard to get excited about Gordon Brown, as he sucks the atmosphere from a room like a dyson on 3-phase.
also, in my local elections, the labour candidate has been found using House of Commons headed paper to send out political 'propaganda' .. he'll probably go to hell for such a travesty against nature and an unforgivable use of stationary. it wouldn't surprise me if someone died because of this hateful crime. god, he's like a terrorist.

Liberal Democrats: unremarkable and empty, seemed realistically accepting of the fact that they'll never win.
but i did like that Vince Cable chap, he's the first politician i've ever heard that actually sounds like a human being. and he reminds me a bit of ken campbell.

Scottish National Party: talked sense for people in scotland, but left me cold. i am not scottish, that's probably why.

UKIP: appears to be a joke party. like a parody of the BNP, but without the dedication.
their poster campaign seems to have been created by spotty teenagers, dirtily giggling to themselves from behind the bike-sheds.

Plaid Cwmru: sort of inconsequential. but good for them.

The Conservative Party: a lot of amazing sounding promises, that are quickly replaced by the overwhelming feeling of being lied to by a guy who would use the death of his own son as a political crow-bar.
alluded to the fact that they were presenting from a building Doctor Who was filmed in, but as a negative. perhaps because david tennant is a labour supporter.
they spend a lot of time moaning that Labour are running a tory-attacking campaign, but i've yet to see any of it. i have seen a huge amount of petty bemoaning from the tory camp to the labour camp though, which isn't "real adult politics," more, "jealous children in the playground."

heh heh.. "labour camp"

so, not a great outlook so far. i didn't expect anyone to channel Barack Obama, but it doesn't bode well that we have a complete lack of inspirational leaders. i suppose i'll just stick to my choice of unashamedly voting tactically. my borough is one of the 'swing states' and it's an incredibly fine line between a labour and tory win.

i'll boil it down to this:
would i vote for a human rights lawyer who - by all accounts - has noticeably improved the town i live in and rebels against his party when he feels strongly about something,
or a management consultant (urgh) for a huge multinational pharmaceutical company based in america, who strikes me as a smug posh-boy?

oh dear. where's tony benn when you need him?

a bug's life

films are good aren't they? this one looks like a spectacular high-art masterpiece.

go go power rangers

they don't make 'em like they used to. in japan.

do you want the truth or something beautiful?

i spent quite a lot of time tonight, staring at a woman in extravagant clothing who sang with a voice more powerful than a circular-saw wrapped in silk. she was singing pop music, too. and at one point she had a bit of flesh on show.

now, i know what you're thinking, you're thinking, "but monster-boy, you hate lady gaga with the hatred of a thousand suicide bombers! what are you doing going to see her live?!"

i will inform you to rest your pathetic excuse for an investigative mind, and quit your jibber-jabber. i would never stoop so low as to bless that demented harlot with my presence. no. i saw Paloma Faith at the shepherd's bush empire. and, i know, it's not the sort of thing i would normally even give two hoots about. 'twas a stab in the dark, a present for a friend whom i had no certainty would enjoy it. thankfully, though, both my hoots and my stabbing device paid off, because she was marvellous.

bloomin' marvellous.

the lady gaga reference is not without relevance. paloma has been compared to the product-placing-sweaty-beast-cow more than a few times by celeb-loving journalists who don't really reserve too many column inches to fact. and in all honesty i spent quite a lot of the gig wondering what it was that made me vomit at the thought of gaga, but was slowly making me fall for the bundle of allure on stage before me. y'know, when supposedly one of them is the "british version of the other."

i posed the question to my companion (an ex-celeb journalist who went freelance to avoid having to talk to idiots), who summed it up with the following justifications:

because paloma faith has a personality.
because she looks like she's having fun, not just there to make money.
because she actually cares about whether the audience are having a good time.
because she makes good music.
because lady gaga's music is completely awful.
because she is actually engaging with the audience, instead of perpetuating the myth that celebrities are a different breed, or that they are earthbound deities.

that seemed like a good start. paloma was beautiful, wonderful, extravagant, but not 'other'. she was a performer completely engaged in making sure she put on an enjoyable show, for us.
and she was funny.
could you see lady gaga putting little amusing quips in between her songs?
quips, maybe. amusing... nope: because they would be quips written by a team of marketing professionals from walkers crisps or bodyform. or kwik-fit. or whoever the tramp-licker had sold her soul to that week.

this turned into a bit of a gaga-attack didn't it. not that that isn't admirable, but what i wanted to say was Paloma Faith is a joy. even if her music doesn't make you wet-at-the-knees, herself is just great. she has style and substance. she is warm and friendly. i like her.

the scorpion king

more stories from the dark end of the audio/visual world

“the first thing i’ll do is tell you that you won’t be able to read anything on the powerpoint slides. we’ve purposefully put loads of data on there, lots of number charts and things, so all the text is far too small to read.
but what i will say is this... it doesn’t matter.”

that’s how he started his presentation. he actually started by declaring that the information he was going to present “didn’t matter.” it was unimportant. it has no use. it could be ignored completely and there would be no loss or any ramifications.

... why put it on screen then?

i’m sure the 100 people in the room who were about to sit and listen to him for the next 6 hours were pretty excited by the prospect of a day without value. i know i was.

this was the same guy that came to me an hour earlier to have a microphone fitted. in the AV industry we call them ‘lavaliers’ and they’re the ones that clip to news reader’s neck-ties. words with more than 3 syllables tend to confuse a lot of the people I work with, so we end up calling them ‘tie-clip mics’ quite a lot. here’s the conversation:

HIM: hi, i’ve come to get a tie-clip mic please.
ME: yep, sure. let me put that on for you.

i begin fitting his lavalier mic by running the head (the mic bit) up through the loop in his tie; it helps keep it tidy. so far, so good.
i get to the suitable place, a couple of inches below his tie knot. normally i’d prefer to go a bit further down, but my work-place has piece-of-shit mic heads and a badly designed P.A. so you have to get as close as possible.

i start to clip the mic to his tie.

HIM: oh, you can’t clip it there!
ME: really? why’s that?
HIM: that’s my hermes tie.

this means fuck all to me.

HIM: it cost me a lot of money.
ME: oh, okay. in that case i can just place it on your lapel.
HIM: no, not there!
ME: an expensive suit, right?
HIM: yes. tell you what, i’ll put it on myself.
ME: no problem.

he lowers the mic head and begins to clip it to his belt buckle.

ME: sorry, i’m afraid it won’t work from there. It needs to be a lot closer to your mouth.
HIM: why’s that?
ME: that’s where the sound comes from.

he raises the mic again, and attempts to place it on his shirt, underneath the garishly patterned hermes tie

ME: oh sorry. that won’t work either i’m afraid. your hermes tie will just rub on the mic all day and all the audience will hear will be a scratching sound.
HIM: it’s a silk tie!
ME: yes. but it will be amplified through a large speaker system.
HIM: okay, i’ll just move the tie over to one side.

he does so… for a moment it looks a bit weird, his tie hanging to one side. not even worth the $180 dollars (i looked it up) it must have cost him.
then it slips back over the mic. i guess he expected gravity to bow down before his over-priced couture.

ME: hmmm.
HIM: well that won’t work.
ME: no. you’re right.
HIM: tell you what, i’ll just shout.

so here i am. listening to a shouty man present an illegible powerpoint presentation about something difficult to hear.
these are the days that make me proud to be an Audio/Visual technician. or if you remove the bits that I’m not really doing today… a technician. although i’m not really doing an awful lot of technicianing. except sitting here writing this blog.

never mind. it’s not like i actually bring a lot to the quality of the society we live in, doing this job. what i will say is, in the words of a great business man i recently worked with – “it doesn’t matter.”


AMMENDMENT
i originally wrote this at about 9.30am.
at about 11.00am, the guy came over to me and asked for a tie-clip microphone. and i could put it on his hermes tie.

all he said was, "everyone will take the piss out of me if i don't."

livin' on a prayer

this video is the entire of modern life in just over four minutes. see as i count the elements every 10 seconds.

0.00 disinterest / 0.10 excitement / 0.20 fear / 0.30 horror / 0.40 concern / 0.50 pain / 1.00 intrigue / 1.10 mirth / 1.20 amusement / 1.30 joy / 1.40 expectation / 1.50 apoplexy / 2.00 sympathy / 2.10 worship / 2.20 respect / 2.30 satisfaction / 2.40 comfort / 2.50 belonging / 3.00 empathy / 3.10 veneration / 3.20 intoxication / 3.30 indulgence / 3.40 alliance / 3.50 jon bon-jovi / 4.00 relief / 4.09 catharsis

the specialist

i know you love hearing about the mebs i work with, and their constant list of idiotic failings. i've got a real beauty for you from this morning.
here's it is:

the conference had started (late). it was an international one with audio phone conferencing from all over the world, and a video conference that was just to Poole (on the south coast if you're a foreign body).

during the conference they decided someone from india should do a presentation.

THEM: hey, could you go ahead and put india up on the main screen?
ME: no, i'm afraid not.
THEM: oh... why not?
ME: because they are on a telephone.
THEM: but don't you have video conference facilities?
ME: yes, but they are dialled in on a telephone.
THEM: oh. what does that mean?
ME: "dialled in on a telephone"?
THEM: yes.

person in india begins to speak over the phone to the auditorium here in london. my conversation continues at the back of the room.

ME: .... it means they are on a telephone in india listening to our conference, and if they speak we can hear them.
THEM: but we can't put them on screen?
ME: no. i'm afraid not.
THEM: but we can put Poole on screen?
ME: yes. they are dialled in on a video conference.
THEM: so why can't we put india on screen?
ME: they are on a telephone.
THEM: can we dial them in on a video conference instead?
ME: yes, but we will only be able to hear them.
THEM: oh really, why is that?
ME: because they only have a phone. a phone does not have a camera in it.
THEM: my phone has a camera in it.
ME: yes. i see that. .... it is very different technology i'm afraid.
THEM: but could i dial them with my phone, and then we could connect it up to our system here?
ME: uh... let's start from the beginning. what phone do they have in india?
THEM: i don't know.
ME: okay. what phone do you have?
THEM: a blackberry.
ME: right. well perhaps you should take it to india.
THEM: ha ha!
ME: yep. funny. also... irrelevant, as the person in india has finished what they were saying.
THEM: okay, thanks anyway for trying.
ME: no worries.

today i invented the word "meb."

meb pronounced /meb : a person of such stupidity that no other word will do. "look at that guy, he is such a meb"

your mother's got a penis

you are the victim of a very clever joke. in a world where corporate executives combine their forces with clever advertising companies to trick you into buying their sub-standard product, you have been sucked in by the very worst. we've already fallen to the Betamax vs. VHS fuck up. you probably - like me - bought an oasis album back in the 90's, when you could've spent the money on a second copy of blur's park life. you are more than likely guilty of watching humourless twat-machine the x factor a couple of times, rather than encouraging ITV to run much more superior repeats of Sharpe.
i bet you even favour ant & dec over charlie brooker, you dirty heaving travesty upon nature.

it's not all your fault though. you've just been manipulated by some terrible people with unlimited funds. you've just found your genitals trapped in the button-up flies of the lowest common denominator. it brings a tear to the eye, doesn't it?

but luckily, you have me to help. luckily for your soul and self-respect i am here to point out where you may fail as a human. phew...

with this latest example the whole ploy is a big fat joke: your hard-earned pocket money is the punchline, and the belly laughing audience are the freeloaders that run lady gaga's record company.

as we know from daily attack, success in popular culture has absolutely nothing to do with skill or talent. in sport you need to be good at your sport, but in pop culture it's much more about the media frenzy that surrounds you. just look at katie price - she brings nothing positive to society, yet is one of the most successful cartoon characters in history.

i'm interested in the limits of this effect, and that's why lady gaga is such a good test subject. lets look at the evidence.
gaga was plucked out of nowhere, and i've seen little or no evidence that she worked hard to deserve the plucking. no effort put in, seemingly she is just a mindless drone with no sense of self-worth, that would do anything she is told for money. a bit like a prostitute.
secondly, there was speculation a little while back when audience members swear they saw a hunk of man-meat slide out of her pants. of course it wasn't real, but boy did the internet catch fire with cockspiracy theories.
her album is called "the fame".
she always looks like a fucking idiot.
every act she puts on serves only to get herself in the press again, when what she should be doing is spending time improving her music.

which leads to me to the main point:
supposedly, her raison d'etre is as a music maker, that's why she releases singles. but her music is beyond terrible. far beyond. i had a motorbike accident once, it hurt, but when i overhear lady gaga songs (usually out of some cunt's over-pumped headphones on the tube) i tend to hark back to the much-more-pleasant feeling of tarmac wearing through through my knee-caps, and it calms the aggravating tinnitus of: "ma-ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-ma-poker-face-ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-ma-poker-face-ma-ma-poker-face, come on barbie, let's go party, ma-ma-ma-poker-face, ma-ma-poker-face."

vomit.

and now this:

a clear demonstration of how no-talent, blot-on-humanity wrecks can make money by running their pinky around their sphincter and beckoning, and then not delivering the goods. metaphorically.

the most haunting memory i have of the whole piece of pointless film-making is the end, where it says "to be continued..." please, god, no. end it. end it now. before i put all my life savings into damaging you beyond repair.

there are 10 obvious product placements in that video. i don't remember the jam ever being in an advert for calor gas. or fleetwood mac eating at wimpy.

gaga is the embodiment of nonsense. watch any interview with her and you'll soon see she can't be any more than a cognitively removed corporate muppet, on permanent reception of hard puppet-fisting from a record company exec. her existence is basically pointless and only serves to hold back the human race.

"hey, i'm a a-vont guard artist. to prove my credibitlitty have a look at my pepsi-branded nipple."
- lady gaga

don't be the victim of this vicious practical joke. save yourself and those around you. edge around the trap. dodge the bucket of filth suspended over your doorway. don't sit on the shit-cushion.

consider yourself warned.
you're welcome.

romeo must die

last november i attempted to write a novel in association with nanowrimo, and failed dismally, managing to write only 10,482 words of my 50,000 word target. rubbish. stoopid social life.

however, if man were to have given up after his first failure we would never have invented the wheel, the internal combustion engine or pork pies. so i'm gonna try it again.


this time, i'm writing a script. 100 pages in 30 days. and i'll be writing in collaboration with the troubadour which is lucky, because he did actually manage to write 50,000 words in november (before having a mental crash and trying to invade surrey).

so that's the challenge.

i hope i make it.

i really hope actually, because - if the troubadour can get the last week of august off work - the organisers of the edinburgh fringe festival are expecting us to do more with our stage slot than just stand there with an apologetic expression on our faces.

no pressure though*.

(* i didn't breathe the entire time it took to type that)

the write stuff

any regular readers will be aware that i spend a lot of my time working with a bunch of morons. quite a bit. everyone does, i'm nothing special. it's hard to avoid when almost everyone is a moron.
i - for one - am one.

recently i asked for some pens for my department. some sharpie permanent markers to be specific. they're pretty useful in my line of work, for putting temporary labels on equipment and bushy eyebrows on sleeping technicians. and they're advertised by david beckham, a big player in the world of high quality stationary equipment, so they must be good.

so anyway, i asked for a few new sharpies as ours had all disappeared over time, probably accidentally home in people's pockets, into the arts & crafts cupboard in my lounge, or something.

after some filled-out forms and a few other levels of pointless bureaucracy my request was authorised and it looked like my journey to pen-ville was to be as smooth as a sea-lion's brunch.

imagine my surprise, when right at the last hurdle i received an email from an admin assistant asking me to justify my request:

Hi
Sorry for taking so long to get back to you. I have been on leave.
Could you give me more details as to what the markers will be needed for?
Thanks.
Manuela

what? you want details on how i'm going to use some pens? when they've been authorised by three separate managers higher up than you?

the word 'details' jutted temptingly out of the email, and cheekiness beckoned like a pole dancer with a mortgage.

i replied:

hey there manuela,

you asked for some more helpful details on the use of felt-tip pens. please find some helpful details below. i severely hope they are helpful and detailed enough.

we use the pens for writing/labelling sound desks, microphones, screens, various bits of equipment. the unrivalled beauty of permanent markers is that they are able to write on PVC insulating tape (available in most good DIY shops), which is what we use as the basis of our labels. the labelling is likely to change many times each day, so it is not just a case of making a permanent label using a labelling machine (we do have one of these, but as i mentioned earlier in this sentence - it is not a perfect label machine for the labelling job).

a good black permanent marker on some PVC tape will provide a bold and clear label, even at times of low-light or dense atmosphere. it will also remain on the PVC tape when you use the equipment, rather than other pens which will rub off immediately after application. perhaps try to write on your PC screen with a biro, for a similar effect.

a première example of the PVC tape/permanent marker combo is for labelling our Sony UHF Synthesized Transmitter UTX-B1 radio microphones. you can mark each microphone with the name of a presenter, thus providing an efficient and professional service when multiple speakers are presenting at an event. you can also quickly change the labelling in times of rapid label-changing emergencies, so the whole procedure is frighteningly adaptable.

we will use markers for marking up sound desks, where the desk channels are regularly changing. please re-read the above paragraph for examples of just how good this system is. (remember to replace the words "Sony UHF Synthesized Transmitter UTX-B1 radio microphones" with "sound desks" or you won't gain anything.)

if you ask any AV engineer worth his salt he will name the following things as his most important tools:
PVC tape, Leatherman, Sharpiepermanentmarker-pen.
if he doesn't, you should take steps to get him fired. i hope you will.

in all seriousness, they are vital to our work, and they help us work to a high level. we've always had them. they are as standard as gaffer-tape and batteries. if there's an issue, perhaps we could have a barcode system where we sign them in and out. and/or have security check us each time we leave the building. i would happily swap someone rummaging around in my underwear for the ability to write names on stuff.

i hope this helps. i look forward to some pens.

thanks

me
events audio/visual team leader and all-round jolly nice bloke

the pens arrived three days later.
winner = me.

forget paris

picture the scene, it is thursday morning:

YOUR BOSS: what did you do last night, anything fun?

YOU: well, i did have the opportunity to go and see a comedy show filled with laughs and fun and improvising. and it was only £5. in a cool venue, surrounded by excellent people and a really exciting atmosphere. and really easy to get to, near London Bridge station.

BOSS: sounds ace! i wish i'd known about it, i would've definitely gone to that. did you have fun?

YOU: i didn't go in the end, i was a bit tired and couldn't be bothered.

BOSS: you are a stupid fucking idiot. i'm removing your holiday entitlement. go and sit in a cupboard.

see you at the show:

paint it black

this is the worst tattoo i have ever seen.


this is the best:

face/off

facebook is a weird place. everyone seems to have a different experience of it. i myself spend between 8-23 hours every day focussing my dwindling pupils on the white-background-blue-type nonsense, eager to be informed that emma and ian are constantly flirting with glistening sexual repression. and "clare made a cake but can't seem to do anything right, boo-hoo :(((((("

facebook enters me through my computer, links to my blog and my twitter problem. it's right there in my phone, too (when my piece-of-shit unreliable-as-my-sphincter phone feels like it). basically it's like an airborne infection that you can't avoid, unless you avoid it. i don't avoid it. but i do censor it. because it's really weird otherwise.

the weirdest part of it is the whole 'friend-request' business. recently i've had a fair few new friend requests from people. that's quite nice i suppose. people want to be my friend, i should be thankful. i spent the last 29 years in a mental hole surrounded by imaginary friends, only some of which actually liked me, so it's quite lovely that a bunch of people want to associate with me. thanks.
i just find it a bit weird when i meet people for about 5 minutes, and the next day they try and install themselves on my life, tapping into my news-feed so that they can see what i did earlier that day and when i last took a photo. that's a level of information i'm unwilling to give a stalker, let alone a stranger.

recently i broke a personal rule and added two work-mates to my friend list. i justified this for two reasons.
1: i counter-balanced by deleting friendships with four people. these four people constantly updated their status with dullard information about what celebrity they liked and other pointless drivvel anyway, so it was no loss.
2: my two work-mates seem to take great delight in some of the things i write, which gives my ego an absolutely enormous erection.

i've also known them for quite a while now, and they've regularly seen me in my worst possible physical conditions when i turn up for work stinking of rum-punch and crying. it just saves me from having to talk when they can simply go online and read my innermost thoughts.

i will never put my relationship status on facebook. that is a terrible idea. i did that before, and it only resulted in a couple of failed suicides. if you want to know which sea creature i'm boning, why not contact my mum?
you don't know my mum? yes, that's right... because you don't actually know me.

facebook friends are people who i actually want to be in contact with, are members of my family, or are people i want to bombard with useless information about my life (or abuse). if i don't add you please don't take offense, it's possibly not because i didn't like you, it's probably because i don't remember who you are.

cheery.

robots

i like this

a history of violence

i should write more, i know. what would you do with your lives if you didn't have my amazing words to feast your tiny insignificant eyes upon? and apparently you usually improve the more you write, so potentially i could become the best writer in all of humanity (past, present and future) if i only sat down and wrote for another 20 minutes or so.

oh well.

this guy has already written stuff, so you might as well read that instead.

american werewolf in paris

some people are better at writing than me.

go here to read the words of maddox.

if you can't be bothered to stretch your finger out and press it, here's a section from his article about fashion:

There are very few people who look good in red lipstick, and those people usually juggle for a living. I once met a girl who was able to pull it off, so I let her buy me dinner. Later that night she was making out with my wang, when I realized that all that lipstick was rubbing off. So I evacuated my moan-maker from her face hole, took some silverware for my trouble, and snuck out of her tent.

Red lipstick looks horrible on most women, and all men. The bright crimson hue is an unnatural abomination pushed upon your face by cynical cosmetic industry scientists. I'm sure somewhere in a laboratory, two scientists are high-fiving each other, laughing at all the bullshit new names for shades of red they invent. There have been literally thousands of names for the same color of lipstick over the years, yet there are only about 3 shades of red: red, dark red, light red. Period. And I mean that grammatically, and not menstrually, though the context makes sense now that I think about it. They just make up names as they go along, and you idiots keep buying the same three shades of red over and over again:

the little mermaid - a restaurant review/short tale of morality & deception

thai orchid, clapham high street
from the outside it looks like a perfectly decent place to eat. looking through the window it's tastefully and simply decorated with bare wooden panels and floor. there's a bit of leather here and there. there's a groovy mezzanine level at the back where you'd get to eat if it became really busy. i hope that doesn't happen though, that would be significantly unfair on the good restaurants of the world.
it was pretty cold inside when we first entered, but it was absolutely freezing outside so we stuck with it and carried on with Plan A.

mistake.

"what would you like to drink?" we were asked, almost immediately after sitting down. it was difficult to answer as the wine list was so vague it may as well have just been a list of the dialects of the world.
"could you give us a couple of minutes please?" we answered, taking our coats off. the waiter was a strange chap with limited understanding of personal space. the movement as he left us was a unusual mix of sinister-slinking and a skip.

screw it, we decided to have champagne. we called the odd chap back over; which wasn't difficult as he had stayed within earshot, and had stared at us intently with a curious smile on his face. it was like eagerness, disguised as a sexual predator.
"we'd like a bottle of champagne please."
"yes. red or white?"
"wha..? it's champ... umm.. white please." we glanced at each other, "oh and could we have some tap water?... oh you've gone"
and he had gone. wandered off - it turned out - to find someone more senior who could open a bottle of champagne.
one spillage and a wine-bucket of cold water later and we were at least drinking champagne. from glasses chunky enough you could hammer nails into a supporting wall admittedly, but that could just have been be a design choice to match the rugged hardwood floors and haunting air-temperature.

"would you like to order?" the far away smile had returned.
"yes please. how many fish-cakes do you get in a starter?"
"i don't know... five or six i think." he gazed at us. it was uncomfortable.
"okay, could we get one of those between us please?"
"yes." he smirked and wandered off again. we didn't really converse with him about food any further, although he did remain a claustrophobic presence in our lives for the rest of the evening.

a couple of minutes later the more senior member of staff who'd opened our champagne arrived. "would you like to order please?"
"oh, i thought we'd already started that." i said, because we did. but this chap had a notepad, and a slightly less threatening demeanor.

the 'fish'-cakes arrived within a minute or two (never a great sign). freshly deep-fried from the packet from whence they were squeezed, they sat there in an oily substance we could only hope was oil. i describe them as 'fish'-cakes because there was minimal evidence of any real fish. in fact, on slicing them open some of them contained a gristly substance that could only be realised as 'cheap nasty meat.' this was not great for the vegetarian i was spending the evening with. we were either eating very bad fishcakes that had been padded out with low quality chicken bits, or we were the first humans to taste the flesh of a mermaid.
neither was preferable.

at this point the prices on the menu went from "very reasonable" to "highly suspicious," and had we not had a bucket of cold water and a bottle of champagne (resting on the table next to us) would have walked out there and then.

my companion had a pad thai for mains. although her report suggested that you'd get a better pad thai from wagamama's. which is a japanese restaurant.
i wanted a nasi goreng, and according to the ingredients on the menu that's basically what i was getting. albeit with a different, more unique-to-this-restaurant name. at this point the staff seemed very distinctly not-from-anywhere-near-thailand, at all.

the mains were as good as to be expected at this stage. not terrible though. i mean, not great, but not supernaturally evil or life-threatening. admittedly i didn't touch the mussels, which didn't seem to have been cleaned and most certainly had a vague greenish tinge. all food was delivered by the strange creature who'd ignored our request for water, and had to be reminded twice before eventually delivering it with what he probably considered, a flourish.

some vastly over-cooked squid and a distinct lack of some promised ingredients later (no fried egg, no.... um.. vegetables - luckily we'd ordered side dishes) and we were ready to leave. as in, we were still ready to leave from that time earlier when it became evident that this was going to be shite. still, freedom was imminent and the fresh, biting winter air was beckoning to us as it whistled past the road-works outside.

creepy-smiling-weirdo was back.
"could we split the bill half-and-half please? on each of these cards?" i asked.
"could you pay for everything and she can pay you back?" he responded, signaling my companion with the side of his head.
...
"no."

as we were leaving (thankful for the timing) a stench began emanating from the general direction of the back of the restaurant. it could have been the kitchen or the toilets. i wouldn't want to put money on which one; but just before we left, my cohort - rather bravely i thought - decided she needed to pay a brief visit to the latter. on returning she had a unrecognisable expression on her face.
"i don't want to talk about it," she said as we left.
"fair enough," i replied, feeling very british. and how british we were to soldier on through what was - by far - the worst meal out i've ever had (and i've had a McChicken sandwich from macdonalds.. which have less chicken in them than the fishcakes).

i implore you, do not go to thai orchid on clapham high street. not unless you're the sort of person that enjoys having your wallet raped and your tongue beaten up.

hideous.

battle of britain

do you like comedy? you should come to this show. it might well be very funny. i'm in it and everything. but there are also some very talented improvisers too, so you should at least get a chortle on your chops at some point during the evening.

if you don't, you are a heartless swine and i demand your demise.

here is a link to the facebook page: the facebook page

fight club

i've never had a fight. never ever. some would say it's because i am so charming no-one would ever want to punch me.
some would say my intellect is so great that i could see the potential violence approaching from such a distance, and i can easily avoid it. sometimes from as far away as 24 hours.
some would say it's because if you lay down and allow someone to pummel seven shades of fecal matter out of you, it's not called 'fighting' it's called 'being a pussy'.

a man looked at me funny once, but i gave him my iPod and five-hundred pounds and that seemed to calm him down. he looked a little confused at first, but then gathered up his blanket, punnet of strawberries and penguin classics copy of bonjour tristesse and ran off to catch a tram. phew! disaster averted. i left the park with my dignity intact (bar a tiny urine stain on my trousers).

and then there was that time when louisa whitehead put a bit of lettuce on my head when we were on the school bus. that could've turned really nasty (she was built like a cage-fighter), but luckily my sobbing and mewling sounds were enough to make her say she was "getting off at the next stop anyway."

if i were in a fight, i reckon there's only one way it would go. obviously i would kick their arse. i'd destroy their bones, mangle their face and leave them a sad sack of leathery crumble. they would slither home on a lubricant of their own vomit, begging for their mother to come and lick their wounds.

or it would go like this:

the midnight meat train

for a new year's resolution i decided to give up meat, as some form of weight loss technique invented in my own head. i had total intentions of seeing through the whole year, believing entirely that the fatty deposits i call "my torso" would just disintegrate into solid manly muscle. this was proved to be a crazy, stupid and moronic plan as soon as i reached 3rd january and realised the list of food i'd eaten so far this year were
pizza
cake
fish and chips
pizza again (at 3am)...

cheese.

i also had a vegetarian trying to convince me that the whole thing was a terrible idea and i should just eat the stuff i enjoy, meat included.
a vegetarian who encourages carnivoring? brilliant! (thats the kind of veggie that you'd actually enjoy spending time with, not like the other faggots)... anyway, i took her wise advice, but for the purposes of self moderation i thought i should at least stay veggie for january.

january is nearly at an end. tomorrow is february. that means i can eat meat. fucking ace.
and it's lucky, because the meat fast has started to have an effect on my subconscious. bizarrely i found a video that exactly replicated the dream i've had for the last 8 nights.

a song a day for january: 31

i live in london and it is fucking brilliant.

living here has had it's ups and downs, and there was a period of about 2 years where i hated everything about it and couldn't wait to leave. that's all changed now. there's too much to do, too many people to see, too many jokes to laugh. london is alive, colourful, historic and full of culture. it is a goulash of nationalities. it is a casserole of music and comedy and joy and opportunity.

don't get me wrong, i love going outside of the M25 and seeing the world. there's fresh air out there. there's peace and tranquility. there are places of natural beauty that could even rival the dome of st. paul's cathedral or stockwell tube station. there's no traffic. there's my family. there are pubs that serve pint glasses filled with prawns. i can go out into the world and love it, i can walk through a park in margate and barely even notice the drugs.

it only lasts a few days though. once i hit about 4-6 days of tranquility i start getting itchy hands and a nervous tick. i need stuff. i need to walk down tottenham court road at 2am. i need to catch a live comedy show or eat in a korean restaurant. i need to catch a bus in the early hours. i need the comforting sound of police helicopters and big issue salesmen. i need a shop that sells CDs.
none of these things exist outside london.

the video to london calling by The Clash was filmed on cadogan pier on the river thames, right near chelsea bridge and walking distance from the houses of parliament. you couldn't get more london-ey unless you bathed in London Pride dressed as a pearly king.
i recently undertook a pilgrimage to the rock historic (historock?) pier. now it's a corporate business centre with boats that operate as offices. you can't even get on it as it has a big gate blocking the way, and i was wearing a leather jacket so i didn't want to swim over.
i would've liked to smell joe strummer's guitarry sweat, but instead i smelled the corporate stench of profitability guidelines (to which i am allergic). hah. that is SOOO london.

i went with this girl, though. she also lives in london, which improves it even further.

(this is not a) love song

a song(s) a day for january: 30

promises, promises.

i went on a bit of a rampage and found loads of songs i like on youtube. i didn't know any of the bands or songs before today so i won't explain them. what would i explain exactly?
"oh hello, i clicked on a link and it changed my life"
knob-rot.

anyway, here they are:
Obits - Pine On


Grand Archives - Oslo Novelist


Fruit Bats - The Ruminant Band
(i really like this one... no really)


Handsome Furs - Can't Get Started


Foals - Balloons

a song a day for january: 29

following almost seamlessly from yesterday's delve into the pretentious writings of my past, and their application to live gigs what i have been to; i present duke special, the only contender to gogol bordello's 'best live band ever in the world ever ever' crown.

duke special's drummer is called temperance society chip bailey. i bloody love him. as a retired drummer myself i can only gaze in envy at how cool he is. you can see how cool he is by watching this video:

although, that wasn't the song i wanted to show you for today. i love it, but here is the song for january:

okay, i admit it, i'm running out of days in the month, and i still have lots more songs i love. tomorrow i'm gonna try and get five in without you noticing.

priscilla: queen of the desert

it's not very often that beauty products manage to trundle out an advert campaign that isn't completely misleading.

however, this one advertising cheryl cole is totally accurate as far as i'm concerned.

although i think they missed one:

a song a day for january: 28

gogol bordello are made of ancient folk mythology. their gypsy-punk mental faces are like a thing you might find hiding in a romany caravan; ready to jump out and do fiendish magical spells on any unsuspecting circus freaks that may pass by. they are quite the most incredible band i have ever seen live.
there is no way a single-song set on the david letterman show could ever convey the feeling of 5000 people in hammersmith apollo, all pogoing in complete unison. but it will have to do:

a song a day for january: 27

to be honest it's been a real struggle to resist putting a ben folds song on here for the last 26 days. i love him more than i love boobies. he is by far my favourite singer/songwriter of all time. in fact, it wouldn't have been hard for me to pick my 31 favourite ben folds songs and had one for every day in january. but that would've been pretty damn lame.

whatever, i find his lyrics poetic and incisive. i find his music and arrangements disturbing and powerful. i find his face welcome and wistful. and when i see him live, i find him with a map.

ben folds is cool. here's the video:

white noise

i am an AV engineer. and a damn good one. i've been doing it for about 8-9 years now and - in my current job - there are never any requests for anything that i haven't done many many times before.

so for example, when an events organiser (after reeling off a list of requests for an exciting accounts department day, with music and games and fun* team-building exercises!) smugly says to me "hey, i bet these are pretty unusual ideas aren't they? we wanted to make it a bit different ha ha!"
.. how i really want to respond is, "i remember when i sound engineered the royal philharmonic in a huge concert hall with a sound disrupting parabolic dome ceiling, and had to balance an opera singer with a baroque guitar and a 90-piece orchestra, nothing your pissy little 'team-talk' could throw at me would make me think harder than when i'm wiping my arse."

but i can't. i actually like my job and would rather do it than have to queue up at the dole office with the dirties.

i also hear the same questions and comments o'er and o'er again (the AV engineers out there will concur with a facial expression resembling someone about to vomit). i have pretty much an identical conversation every morning, with whoever is presenting that day. they will usually supply me with the worst powerpoint presentation file i have ever seen, then try and make small-talk as i am testing their microphone. firstly they will blow into it. i don't know why people do this. it doesn't make any sense unless they are trying to damage the equipment on purpose, or planning on communicating with their arse-licking dullard audience solely through the medium of breath.
i will then leave them to practice for a while, while i try and get past the company firewall to look at freakish pornography.

i will soon be interrupted...

presenter: "will everybody in the room hear me?"

technician: "yes, you are paying for loads of expensive audio equipment; and a sound engineer who got here 3 hours before you to test everything"

p: "because sometimes the I.T. doesn't work properly in these venues"

t: "this isn't I.T., it is audio and visual equipment. that's what A.V. stands for. i am not an I.T. technician you patronising fuck-bush."

p: "oh! are you the D.J.?! ha ha ha ha ha ha! shall i do some karaoke?!"

t: "not if you don't want to be beaten to death with an XL-8, no."

p: "oh right. if i stand next to the lectern, will that make the microphones feedback?"

t: "if you don't know what you're talking about you shouldn't be speaking."

p: "oh, i can't connect my laptop to the building's wireless network. could you sort it out for me?"

t: "i'm not an I.T. technician. that is literally a completely different department. it's like asking me to do you a platter of luxury wraps."

p: "your equipment looks complicated, do you know what ALL the buttons do?"

t: "yes. it is my job."

p: "i bet you learn a lot from sitting in all these conferences don't you?"

t: "i sleep quite a lot. this job is easy and i have absolutely no interest in what you are saying. you are an accountant."

p: "can you play this song by M People as i walk up onto stage?"

t: "fuck you, you stupid fucking cunt."

* forced fun is not actual fun.

a song a day for january: 26

i'd never heard of this band until about 2 weeks ago. upon investigating tickets to one of their gigs i discovered:
a) they were all completely sold out.
b) when they were available, they were going for about £100 each.

damn it.

i think the video is amazing.

a song a day for january: 25

mmm... one of the best songs ever, played by one of the founding members of fleetwood mac and a man with a moustache. what more could you possibly want?

a song a day for january: 24

that rhiannon, what i mentioned yesterday, becomes a year older today.
this is for her. it is one of the best songs of all time.

a song a day for january: 23

my friend rhiannon is having a birthday party today. she is part human and part unicorn.

a song a day for january: 22

did you see where the wild things are? i thought it was great, like watching kids playing in a park or dancing to the theme tune from thomas the tank engine.

a song a day for january: 21

i showed this song to you once before, but it felt right to put it in for my january extravaganza. i'm directing you towards the rumble strips as a whole, but i've always particularly liked this track. it reminds me of a good time in my life.
i am also happy to report that despite my worries back in 2008, they have not fucked up their careers or integrity, and have instead made some brilliant music.