Tuesday, October 29, 2002 :

ah yes

nearly forgot to mention that having been minding my mate's Real Madrid season ticket for the last week (two disappointing draws) I have had to buy a ticket for tomorrow's Rome game, and it cost me 13 (thirteen) Euros. Get in. (Or ponte dentro as they would most likely say)

Monday, October 28, 2002 :

For Bandy

"Hull is the biggest city in Europe never to have graced a top division." I wonder where you get hold of a statistic like that.

Friday, October 25, 2002 :

monsters

facial hair
"...the male beard communicates an heroic image of the independent, sturdy, and resourceful pioneer, ready, willing and able to do manly things."
except manly shaving activities it would seem
yet all but the oldest beards are contrived objects... only those who have never shaved have a true beard

Clifford Cringe

I don't know if you have heard about the top secret document containing the associate whinge at Clifford US. I frankly hope it doesn't become widely available

Thursday, October 24, 2002 :

Stroppy partner: “what exactly is your involvement on this deal, you appear to be nothing more than a glorified para–legal”?

Tucola: “couldn’t have put it better myself”.

it's been a long time

since any of you have heard from me but...
good morning london... i'd like to introduce the spoof band of our time

Wednesday, October 23, 2002 :

UK Car industry strikes back

We've got a new Mini, a new Bentley and in his latest film, after having put up for too long with transport more at home on the middle-management company car wishlist, Mr Bond is driving something befitting a man of style - the new Aston Vanquish. Sadly these days the Mini is made by BMW, Bentley is owned by Volkswagen and the Vanquish is a closer blood relative to the Ford Fiesta than it is to the DB4 from Goldfinger. Never mind, though, another once great British manufacturer is poised to unleash this - the X-Power

The mere fact that's it available with nitrous oxide injectors as a factory fitted option elevates its manufacturer to the realms of the truly wicked. In days of stringent emissions tests and ever-dwindling chances to be even vaguely antisocial on the road, the fact that a mainstream manufacturer is proposing to sell an off-the-shelf motor with 900bhp and a button which injects nitroglycerine into the engine has got to be cause for celebration. And the manufacturer? None other than the one-time purveyor of slightly hotted-up Metros - MG.

Tuesday, October 22, 2002 :

....ing the Afternoon away

I've been drinking a lot of tea lately, and its remarkable that I've been spending a lot more time in the smallest room on our floor. Does tea make you go more, or is it just that I'm drinking more liquid? Also, what was the name of the Carry On film with the toilet factory in it?

Monday, October 21, 2002 :

Keep politics out of this.

The guess the evil dictator/comedy character thing has been drawn to my attention again via metafilter, only it has learnt a fair bit since I last saw it a couple of years back. Seems pretty familiar with characters from the Office, for example. Good time wasting fun anyway.

Friday, October 18, 2002 :

This is amusing, about a case apparently going on in the High Court of a man charged with stealing coat hangers from hotels.

Stuck for a word? Try this. Pretty cool I thought.

Friday diatribe

Hmm, coming through central London this morning on wet, greasy roads got me pretty pissed off with pedestrians but it made me think what the key issue for road-users is.

For me, it’s not education, or obeying the rules, it’s responsibility. I think it would be a total drag if I got fined by the cops for jay–walking because I didn’t wait for the green man, or I had to take a test and pay yet more extortionate rip–off insurance to ride a push–bike. But with the freedom I expect comes a corresponding duty towards other road-users.

The problem with the pedestrians this morning was that they were not taking responsibility for what they were doing. Their method of crossing the road was to increase their pace to an ineffectual scurry, quite insufficient to remove their silly arses from my path in time, and put their heads down and not look at me. Then it’s my problem to brake and not run them over, right? Not good enough guys. If you are going to break the rules, fine. I couldn’t care less. But what I find unacceptable is when you break the rules and create an inconvenience for me while I’m abiding by the rules.

Another example: traffic lights take a long time to change and sometimes, everyone seems to be sitting there with no–one on a green light. In those circumstances, if a cyclist wants to skip the lights, I don’t have a big problem with that. But if he’s going to do it, he’d better be damn sure he’s not going to hold anyone up who has obeyed the rules and waited for their turn. He’d better not cause a pedestrian, crossing on a green man, to have to jump out of the way and then react to the pedestrian’s legitimate expression of annoyance by turning round and shouting “cunt”, as happened to me the other week (Certain cyclists can be very arrogant, holier–than–thou tossers — I suspect something to do with the fact that they perceive that they’re doing something “worthy” by cycling rather than using the car. Almost as bad as joggers who feel that they have the right to elbow pedestrians out of the way and run across roads in front of traffic rather than allow their pulse–rate to drop out of its optimum zone. But I digress…)

Basically, take responsibility for yourself out on the roads. Be considerate to other road users. Be twice as careful if you’re going to break a rule. Don’t hold other people up, or worse, by your inconsiderate behavior. Don’t be a wanker and we’ll get on fine.

Gran Hermano

Second post of a hectic morning - you may have noticed I pulled out of commenting on the actual plot of the movie in case people ahven't seen it - some things are just not done. Anyway, the news from Spanish reality TV is they had quite a night last night - the contestant kicked out of the house was a saucy blonde who had been up to naughtiness in the house - in summary, the Spanish middleweight boxing champion is a contestant, has left the inhabitants in no doubt of his status as alpha male (or he will kick their heads in) and had sought the assistance of la jeune blonde with his net practice (ie batting) - she gets kicked out into the jaws of his kick-boxing girlfriend amid most undignified scenes ensue. All in all, really real TV.

Moral Choices

I went to see Spielberg's latest blockbuster "Minority Report" yesterday and was struck by how riddled with moral choices it is. Is it a moral decision to make people sit like vegetables in the audience simply to entertain the masses? Can we really be certain that, despite the expectation, the plot will hold together?

Thursday, October 17, 2002 :

Settling in

As in, you know you are settling in to your new job when you finally bring in the milk, enabling you to enjoy as much milky tea as your heart desires during the working day. It has been a steady but sustained build up of forces: over a period of 8 months I have accumulated a terrible arsenal of mug, spoon, tea, sweetener, kettle, and semi-skimmed, finally unleashed this arvo in a lightning strike. The world already seems a gentler, less unkind place. Must remember to bring in washing up liquid tomorrow.

Wednesday, October 16, 2002 :

Is there any point in cheating? Or are you only cheating yourself?

Tuesday, October 15, 2002 :

Not that I am feeling depressed or anything, but here is a very interesting site about the various ways in which the world can end. These sort of doomsday scenarios do have the positive effect of making the mundane troubles of an average working day seem somewhat less significant. Well, the client may want us to start “running with” these issues by 9 am tomorrow, but has he considered that the universe could be destroyed by Q-collapse before then? Reminds me of the lottery statistic — it is more likely that the world will be destroyed by a catastrophic meteor strike than any one person will win the lottery. Another one: if you buy your ticket for the Saturday draw on the Monday before, you are more likely to die before the numbers get drawn than you are to win.

Monday, October 14, 2002 :

Cum on Feel the Noize

Nickyg, Tucola and I had our first band practice last night. Songs were butchered, neighbours were annoyed and booze was drunk. Tucola (who I should point out is remarkably adept at drumming given he's only had a few lessons) proved that he was even more adept at getting trashed - before, during and after band practice... Evidently a student of famous drumming hellraisers like Keith Moon, John "Bonzo" Bonham and, er, Phil Collins, Tucola has decided to start his rock n'roll career as he means to go on by boozing heavily and injuring himself in bizarre incidents (yesterdays was an attempted WWF "angled body slam" which went slightly wrong). At this rate he'll be dead before our first gig. For my part, I thought I'd written a monster hit tune, which just needed lyrics, before I was informed I'd unwittingly re-written an existing rock standard - when nickyg started singing "Take me down to the Paradise City...".Bastard. Still, was a bloody good larf. Cheers boys.

Friday, October 11, 2002 :

Suggestions on a Postcard Please

Tomorrow is the day of hispanity (el dia de hispanidad) and I am trying to think of an appropriate way to mark the occasion. Any suggestions?

Something I read on zeldman reminded me of when Boy George said that he could never hear the song “Linger” by the Cranberries without thinking about farting (for those who don’t remember “did you have to let it linger, did you have to, did you have to, etc”). I suspect that this remark, instantly imprinted on the minds of all the viewers for all time, was in fact indirectly responsible for the decline and eventual demise of the Cranberries, rather than Denise O’Riordan or whatever her name was getting pregnant which was popularly credited as the reason for their breakup. Share your Boy George stories here.

Thursday, October 10, 2002 :

Nice to be reminded of the Monty Python philosophers' drinking song.

CD rip off

I listen to a lot of CDs at work. It passes the time and, since I discovered that I could play them on this computer I have been much more productive at work (it's much harder to wander around the office/look out of the window/go out and wander round town when you are umbilically attached to the Best of Kenny Rogers and the First Edition by a set of headphones, so you might as well get on with some work). I bought Supergrass's new album earlier this week. I put it in the CD-rom drive of the computer, pressed play and it played for about 3 seconds before hiccupping, and then continuing playing. This happened all the way through the album. I took it back to the shop and got a new one. This was the same, although it worked fine on my mate's computer so I decided my computer must be at fault and kept it to play on the stereo at home where it worked fine. Today, it occurred to me that the same thing had happened to me recently, again with a recently released album, and that there might be more to it than dodgy equipment. Turns out I was right. This article explains how virulent the new anti-piracy measures which are being introduced, some to the extent of buggering up your computer equipment. Something in me thinks this is not right - I don't have an MP3 player, and probably couldn't work it if I did, so why shouldn't I be able to listen to the CD in whatever location I choose. There should at least be a notice on the wrapper to save me the bleeding hassle of going back to the shop, keeping the receipt etc. Humbug.

The Place (not) to be

Interesting article about how the manner in which you are charged for something effects how you use it. Got me thinking about Holmes Place membership. It seems to me that at peak times, particularly in January, they are almost getting to the point at which having their clients actually attending the gym is becoming a problem rather than a desideratum, so they need to discourage people from coming, while still encouraging them to keep paying. Despite this, it is still in their interests to encourage more people to join up, provided they don’t come, unless it’s off–peak. On top of all this, they want all those people who sign up and don’t come to renew at the end of the year nevertheless. This obviously involves enormously difficult and subtle management of guilt, goals and expectations.

By the way I have modified the cool grey look for your viewing pleasure.

Wednesday, October 09, 2002 :

Alright you tax gurus, why can’t I fill my car up with chipfat if I want? In other news, the Inland Revenue have just asked me for backdated tax returns to 6 April 2000, which fills me with joy as you can imagine. Who’s dobbed me in for all that undeclared horseracing and gigolo income?

Never mind the b*******

Check that out.

You like the image? You enjoy talking the talk? Well now it’s time to stop faking it and Walk the Walk!!

Tuesday, October 08, 2002 :

I’m sure coin–operated machines are being set up to periodically rip you off, on the basis that nine times out of ten, you won’t complain and the company will get to keep the money.

Today the drinks machine at work yet again ate my money and gave me neither drink nor change. After doing this, it sat there with an intolerably smug “so I ate your money, what are you going to do about it, dickhead” air.

The machine of course knows that your proactive options run to smashing the hell out of it, with the attendant arrest by the police, dismissal from work, etc, or alternatively calling the “in the event of difficulty with this machine call this number” number.

It knows you know that because the machines are leased, no–one within a ten mile radius of the machine is going to take any responsibility for its recalcitrance. So if you call the number, you would be initiating the lengthy process of having the leasing company send an engineer over to investigate, probably from the other side of London/the country and only after 20 minutes of waiting on hold and explanations. Remember we're talking about 50p here. On arrival, the engineer would open up the machine and find your 50p lodged in the slot where money that is to be ripped off of people is channelled, whereupon he will scornfully hand it over, with righteous indignation that you have been miserly enough to trouble a qualified cold beverage vending services engineer for a lousy 50p. So it knows that in practice, you will do nothing and it will win.

Another example with which you will be familiar is the quizzer in the pub. There are a number of variations. Sometimes, the machine will select a wrong answer that you didn't press, causing you to lose. Alternatively, the machine will wait until you have decided to collect your winnings and fail to dispense the full amount or anything. Another one is to refuse to accept any of your answers and time–out so again, you lose. Once you’ve got into the competitive mind–set of taking on the machine, to lose by default in any of these ways is infuriating. The cheating quizzer is particularly evil, because it preys on the weak and intoxicated — so there’s an additional hurdle to clear of actually noticing that one is being ripped off, even before the punter gets to the “can I be arsed to do anything about it” stage.

Mayor out of Waiting for Guffman has a pop at Pete Shelley out of the Buzzcocks. This is just so ridiculous it beggars belief.

Time to be candied

Pour some sugar on me.

Monday, October 07, 2002 :

Hooked Up

Interesting article in the economist. Starts off as a bit of a boring sciencey piece concerning the internet but the last paragraph contains an interesting analogy.

Thursday, October 03, 2002 :

Time to be candid

Ever get the feeling you've been framed? I do. It has taken a while to dawn on me, but I fully expect to be shown on some documentary about how evil people in this materialistic capitalist world are. Why, you say? (If not, stop reading now). There was a tube strike in London yesterday morning. This didn't ought to affect me as I get the bus, but it does as all the sods who normally get the tube about a mile up the road from me get on my bus, thus preventing me from getting to work without walking. And I'm lazy, so yesterday I hit on a cunning plan. I got a bus at right angles to the main trajectory into town (hence less people stealing seats which rightfully belong to other, regular, users), and alighted at an overland train station. From there I planned to take the train to work as real train drivers were not on strike. This costs £1.90. I had £2.02. Lucky. (Bear with me, this is all relevant). So there I am, facing an idiot automatic ticket machine. There is a tube strike on. Everybody is pissed off, including me by now. They are announcing my train over the tannoy. The machine asks me to pay £1.90. Just as I insert the first of my pound coins, a lady beggar approaches and asks me fairly nicely and quite clearly if I can spare 20p. I truthfully (and, so I thought equally nicely) tell her I only have 2p in change as I need the rest to put in the machine. She mumbles something about how everyone is in a bad mood today. I nod, thinking "of course they bleeding are - there's a tube strike on" and notice that my pound coin has gone straight through the machine. I try the other one, which also falls straight through the machine, which is obviously bust. I grab the coins from the tray at the bottom. She asks me again if I have 20p. I say no, I don't and march round the corner to the next machine as they are still announcing my train. She trails me for a bit asking for 20p and then buggers off. At this point I realise I now have not two, but four coins in my hand. Two of them are twenty pence pieces which must have already been present in the tray when I arrived at the machine. I have just lied to the beggar woman. Shit. However, my train is still arriving, so I buy a ticket from the correctly functioning machine, dash to the platform and shoehorn myself into the imminently departing train. About five minutes later I thought that I should probably have looked for hidden cameras. I'm so slow sometimes.

Reading this website at the moment.

Provocative?

A storm is brewing in the kingdom of ham: El Presidente has decreed that from now on, at the end of every month, we will have a ceremony to "honour the flag" - taking down and worshipping the huge flag at plaza colon. The question is why would you want to do this? Is there some kind of problem with people not being patriotic enough? (There's certainly no such problem as far as I can see.) The answer is that you do it because it irritates (provokes?) the basque seperatists. The reason you shouldn't do it is that before you know it, you have right wing politicians and a lot of men in uniform saluting very large flags, which is all a bit reminiscent of unspeakable things.

Wednesday, October 02, 2002 :

For Spain watchers, you may be interested to hear that the Basque government is going to have a "referendum" on whether the people in the Pais Vasco want a separate state. Of course, Mr Moustache has denounced it as "illegal" and, interestingly "undemocratic".

Today I have a really bad cold. It's terrible. I feel tired, hot, cold, congested, I can't breath and my eyes hurt. The whole world seems like a nasty, less pleasant place. I can't do anything, and it makes me wonder, what if someone really important has a cold at an inopportune time, like a judge, or policeman, or a middle-Eastern dictator?

Amusing article about Tony Blair's latest speech at the Labour party conference.

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