On sticking with it.

I went out last night. I went out with 'Ben' my penis with a personality of a brother-in-law. I had been foisted into things as his companion to go see Paul Weller at the local village hall. I wasn't really bothered about it but tagged along. During the course of the evening I had more beer than I'd drank in the last two years IE two pints. I was a little...smashed. Well, that made the evening fly by. Until we got in the venue anyway. We stood waiting for an hour before the support came on (Brinkman - have you ever seen a decent support act? Me neither. Even when going to see Kylie - three times and counting - you'd think Kylie could have Sugababes! I'd like a Sugababe. Just one; I'm not greedy.). Well, Mr Weller came bounding on and didn't stop bounding for 90 minutes. I hope to have as much energy when I'm the same age. He also friggin' rocked, man. I only recognised four songs but still.

I write this, as I really need a pee and wanted to see how far I could go without having to divert off. As it turns out, quite a way.

As an aside it turns out 'Ben' shouldn't have gone to the pub. 'Kate' was a little peeved. He only had two pints you stroppy, immature bint! Jeez. If only you knew he lived with you 'for convenience'; that he thinks you're a bitch (which you are) and he's massively bored. Still, you keep on moaning, love.

Service shall shortly resume....

Decorators! Gone! In the process made lots of mess. And made my internet....not possible. Gah. Still, I'm back, from outer space, but I've not got, jizzum upon my face (unlike the lady I saw in a video yesterday - drowning? Nearly.)

I may post later. Before Midnight. Or I may post tomorrow. It all depends on my wife's addiction to Scrabble. Find your F5 button and keep pressing for my return is imminent...

I'm Freeee-eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

to do whatever I.............whatever I choose do-do-do do deee dooooooo.

The decorators have moved in and the wife has moved out. Temporarily. To her mothers. Dust, is a bad thing for the wife. It gets, cough, right on her, choke, chest and plays havoc with her, going blue now, breathing. Which leaves me able to play, rest and do no work. For a period of about two hours at a time as I'm going back and forth. Never would I leave her in the clutches of my mother-in-law, she who makes Dr Harold Shipman look caring.

http://www.thingsmygirlfriendandihavearguedabout.com/ is a very funny thing.

A Wasted Day

NB This has nothing to do with being a) drunk b) a drunk.

We were going out. I was dressed. Wifey was making herself look pretty(err). I made a phone call.

Me: Dear BOC. Why are you so crap at delivering oxygen to my wife?

BOC: I'm sorry. Again. He came on Wednesday. Even though he has a key he did not use it for he is not allowed.

Me: Then what is the point of him having it?

BOC: Err....He'll be coming today.

And so we waited in.....and waited....still he's not here. It's lovely outside. We were going to B&Q but I was to surprise the wife with a visit to the pub luncheon department. We wait...

I'm right!

I used to love a good argument. That's why I joined an internet forum. Oh, the fights I used to have...Good times.

These days, I just can't be arsed. Over on the SFX forum right now they're having a ding-dong over wether games should be excluded from the Fun & Games section and it's getting rather over-heated. I'm not going to venture an opinion as I really don't care (although the entire debate centres around a thread I started ages ago). Formerly I may have waded in and decried all the points thus far no matter which side I stood on but now I just can't see the point; It's all a bit 'meh'. I'd rather be reading Scaryduck's Condensed Films to be honest.

A case in point in how I've changed: about a year ago I apparently sent an email to one of the forum saying I didn't like her. I can't imagine doing that now. I'm so indifferent to people I'm almost sociopathic. Look! I've killed me a catholic! Anyway, I apologised. What I was offended about is that she called me insincere! The cheek! Things I'd rather do than be insincere (I'm talking the wasted time factor not the moral obligation to honesty):

Watch Titanic.
Listen to Beyonce Knowles warble.
Read the Bible.

See? It's never gonna happen.

Princess Die

Channel 4 are apparently screening a documentary tonight and may, shock! horror! be showing pictures of the car that carried our beloved Princess Di toward her certain crushing end. There is a furore. And the question is: who really gives a toss? I challenge everyone who does to leave a comment. Lack of comments will of course vindicate this post.

Harry and Willy have requested the photos not be shown. And Channel 4 are ignoring them. Respectfully, of course. The question is being asked on the news that if it was the boss of C4's mother in the car, would he still show the pictures? Is his mother the Queen of Tarts? Is she in the nations hearts? Is, in fact, his mother the only female personality with a bigger place reserved in Heaven ie Mother Theresa? No, I don't belive she is.

I wouldn't mind my mother being shown in this program but then my mothers a bitch and I wouldn't mind her being dragged by the ankles behind a Shire Horse with diarhoea. Channel 4 are presumably a veritible cock-a-hoop at the thought of all the publicity and the swarms of viewers. I propose a compromise: they can show it and no-one watches. Ideal.

Directions

When I started this blog I meant it as a place to review SF&F books and stuff. I don't do that enough. So...

I just finished watching Alias series 1. It was good. I shall now watch West Wing series 4. Anyone that posts spoilers shall be killed in a nasty way. Note the singular 'way'; I'm not wasting good ways on your skinny/fat non-specific coloured ass.

My hands itch. Is it scabies?

Justice the American Way

Some blokes have been arrested for plotting to bomb JFK airport in New Yoik. 'Plotting' is perhaps going a bit far as they were quite a way off even finalising the planning, let alone making the molotov devices (for you can indeed do much damage with a petrol lighter). So the question is: is America, Land of the Free, now arresting people for Thought Crimes? Let's see:

I'm currently thinking of assassinating George 'Dubya' Bush, President of the United States, POTUS, DOOFUS and all round twat.

I have got thus far in my planning: I've had the thought to do so.

Bring it on CIA! Read this and weep NSA!

I'll even go one further: I'm gonna kill all the Senators and Congressmen and women (for I'm sure there is actually a difference but I've yet to work out what it is) and all the Governors except Arnie cuz....you know....it's Arnie. He'd kill me. Using grenades. They wouldn't explode; he'd just insert them with Arnie-force into any available orifice. All the mayor's deserve to die, as do all the Sheriffs. And council members. And the street cleaners. In this instance only, all the smokers will be let off as they're going to kill themselves eventually anyway.

I await the FBI knocking at my door. The clock starts.....NOW.




Justice? Legal?

Bed + Sofa = Nothing!

Next week we have some people coming to invade our house. We invited them but they will turn us upside down. I decorated my bedroom, they'll do the rest of my house. It's only fair after all.

We've been deliberating about this for quite awhile and finally took the final decision when they phoned to say they were coming on Tuesday (we're great believers in waiting until five minutes past the final minute - nobody is too big to be put out). All well and good. Hmm. The decoration sorted we have today been ordering the new furniture; we planned on getting a chest of drawers and a sofabed to help with storage and multifunctionality. We hit. A. Snag. The sofabed we'd been planning on buying was again looked at. We then noticed the section in the Next catalogue that said 'Ahem. Measure your friggin' doors before you order this thing as we're not having it back just becuase you're stupid enough to order it'. Our doors? 74 cms wide. The sofabed? 88x86 on the ends. Now our doors are standard width so either the average Next customer lives in a mansion with barn doors or there's a trick for getting them in. If it had been one door it might not be a problem but we have three doors, two sharp turns and a banister to negotiate. So, no, we didn't order it.

On to www.Sofabed.co.uk They have a lovely one for £349.99. Little do they say that's exclusive of VAT, exclusive of delivery and exclusive of your choice of fabric. The final price? £453. If they'd said that price to begin with I'd have ordered it no question but to lull me into a false sense of security (that's fucking fraud that is!) is disgusting. Avoid this company. If by saying that I stop just one person visiting their shop, I'll have a wank in celebration.

Cunty Sark descending into slagging off London

There are many things on the news that are worthy. Some actually deserve to have their legs spread open and probed before the nation. Others however should just be passed on by.

The story of the stricken Cutty Sark is one such. Who actually gives a toss? OK, the day of the fire it should maybe have got a mention toward the end of the bulletin. But all this time later is there nothing else worth reporting? Have all the famines in Africa stopped? Has no-one been raped today? How many murders haven't taken place?

I have a theory about stories like this and i t involves a formula: something happens. If 1 divided by the square of the distance from London is less than 0.1 it has little chance of appearing. This is because the majority of the media exists in London, to publicise London for Londoners of which the presenters and journalists generally tend to be. I was stuck in a traffic jam once in the Midlands. Not very newsworthy by itself but it was the biggest traffic jam ever to have happened. The police had received a phone call saying one of the supports struts on the M1 and the police closed it. At rush hour. They closed the motorway. Now Londoners like to think the M25 is the only motorway that matters but that's because they're all blinded by coolness. The M1 at that particular stretch is one of the busiest in existence. So all the cars had to find a different route down country lanes. Now, given most of the drivers had never left at that junction, most also had no idea where they were going, myself included. The result? Gridlock for over two hours. Literally. Not one person moved.

Did this appear on the news? Do I need to answer in the negative or have you guessed the answer already?

I'm sure Damilola Taylor was a lovely lad (yeah, right. Inner city youth living in a council flat. Chances of angel-dom? More chance I won't electrocute myself at least once a week.) but kids get stabbed every week in Nottingham.

London bias exists in other ways too. Major millennium projects? Stick 'em in London. The Eye, the bridge, others I'm sure. Every one on the news. How many local projects got on the news? Hmm? Anyway, other ways. Take Wembley Stadium. Surely common sense would dictate it gets put where the majority of people can get to it? Nope. An MP suggested that you can get to Wembley from anywhere in the UK within 4 hours. Try getting from Land's End to just Frikin' Devon in 4 hours, mate. Birmingham would have been a much better idea. But no, the government had to be seen to be supporting the London tourist economy.

And London wages: when I travelled the world easily half the people I met were from London and invariably could be heard declaring the cost of an item was 'nuffink'. Yes, it possibly is when you earn far higher than us plebs outside of the M25. Think about it. Shop worker in...Plymouth might earn £10k. In Chiswick he might earn...estimates....£43k. Now, when looking at Internet holidays Plymouth man might have to think twice; London man probably snaps up 3. Grr.

The kidnapped

Let's take two minutes to think about dear sweet Madeleine and Alan Johnston, both kidnapped without ransom.

....

One minute

......

Bored now.

Given they're still missing is it really possible they'll be recovered alive and whole? Whole in this instance meaning mental as well as physical. It's highly possible in my opinion that dear sweet freaky eyed Mads has been taken a paedophile ring (one for the Google searches there) and put to work on...well, lets not think about that.

At what point do you give up hope and carry on with your lives? It was highly publicised that Madeleine's parents were staying in Portugal to search for her. Of course they were! What the frig else were they going to do? Come back to the UK and continue their jobs, sitting there hoping for the phone to ring? How long can they look realistically look for? Especially when it's been speculated that she could be in the middle of Africa by now.

As for Alan Johnston...held in the middle-east, a place well known for it's hospitality, with no word since his capture - what were his captors hoping to achieve other than killing him? There's been no ransom so it's not money. They've not announced a particular group has got him so it's not notoriety. Perhaps he too has been sold into porn. It's far more likely than he's still alive.

I'm not sure what I'd be thinking if someone I loved were to be taken in the dead of night. I'd probably start at 'bugger' (which incidentally is banned on the SFX forum for it's sexual connection - a thoroughly ludicrous suggestion) and move on to Rambo. Or so I',d like to think.

Shopping? Pah!

Regular readers may realise that my wife has a terminal illness although 'terminal' is stretching things when there's no imminent departure planned. 'Terminal' in this sense means she'll die because of her condition - eventually. She could still live, in theory, until her eighties. Her specific disease is highly unpredictable and very erratic in it's prognosis.

Although the terminal nature of her condition is obviously a bad thing, it has it's advantages. Because of it we were able to convince the council to pay me to care for her via the 'Direct Payments' system. This money is supposed to be used to pay for the sort of things you can normally get from the council: bath chairs, hoists etc.

We found out not long ago that it also pays for you to get the shopping delivered from Tesco. Or Asda. Or even Sainsbury's. We live in hope that M&S get their online act together. The thinking is that while I'd be shopping, I wouldn't actually be caring. I love this mentality. The wife spends the time doing the shopping; I spend the effort putting it away. Perfect synergy.

On my DIY disaster

The cause of the recent spate of DIYness is my wife's breathing problems. A problem for her that is, not me. Obviously.

See, if you have asthma or the overly-complicated acronym COPD, dust, is Bad. In our old place we had wooden flooring throughout for the wife's wheelchair was awful for the carpets. When we moved here and found the joys to be had in carpet we thought "Hmm. Carpet". My feet hadn't felt my own carpet (Note to self: the use of a single word four times in four sentences is a crime. Stop it.) for about five years and just melted in. It wasn't bliss but it was certainly a Tesco's own victoria sponge. So they stayed.

The thing about wooden floors, and is something we realised very quickly with regards to our bedroom, is they show up how much dust gets generated. I can sweep under the bed everyday and get a good handful of dust. It kinda makes you think how much is going into the carpet.

Hence, that fateful Sunday we ripped it up. The floorboards would have been lovely varnished, if not for the paint splatters. I sanded, I scraped, I bought special paint stripper but that paint would not be moved. Wooden flooring was the way to go. In a moment of DIY epiphany I realised the current floorboards would have to be level so I set at them with a hammer and nails.

I did a very good job until I got to the floorboard with pipes beneath it. Oh dear.

What kind of numpty puts pipes directly beneath the floorboards? Everyone apparently. Standard practice my father-in-law claims. Not under the 'boards?

Well, bang, bang, ba-psssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss was the noises heard that day followed by a swift 'Oh fuckery'. It took a few seconds for the realisation to kick in though. This was only after the boiler had kicked in, water had seeped up the new nail and on venturing downstairs to watch the ceiling (not in y crackpot house) only to, first hear it then, see it come from inside the walls - aaah cavity walls. It turns out 'gush' is not just a porn term. Towels! Buckets! Fire Brigade. In that order. Oh, and stopcock was in there somewhere, just a little too late to save the wallpaper. Or the plasterboard. Or the ceiling come to that.

So I now have a 'mint' bedroom and a hallway that resembles those only on the choicest council estates.

Today in my quest to finish decorating the bedroom I planed the bottom of our bedroom door. When flying on Concorde you could view the curvature of the Earth and now you can view the curvature of my bedroom door.

PS Nana has just this minute returned. I feel an ode coming on:

Nana!
You're back!
You're black!
But then you were before.

NANNANANANANANANA

It's been 'suggested' to me that I should have posted an altogether similar picture of Nana:

Maybe I too should send an email to everyone I know. It hasn't worked for Madeliene but it might for Nana.

One Note Cereal

I went on a diet once. It was what I call 'A Bad Time'.

I wasn't that overweight but I was developing a middle tyre (which to be honest is prevalent in my family - it's the family shape - so if genetics says this is gonna happen, how can I possibly fight it?) so set about making my diet slightly healthier. Exercise was, at the time, out of the question, so out was to go sugar, potato, rice, pasta and bread. HAHAHAHAHA.

Have you ever tried not eating those five? Leaving aside breakfast for the minute, what do you possibly eat for lunch if not a sandwich? What hellish universe has the concept of no: mash, boiled potatoes, roast potatoes, potato gratin, chips, curry, chilli con carne, lasagne, spaghetti bolagnese or tuna pasta bake for dinner?

For breakfast there's obviously quite a choice. Nestle and Kellogg's seem to have cornered the market on dietary breakfast. I stood perusing the shelves. I glanced at my beloved Frosties, the gorgeous Honey Monster on Sugar Poofs, the only two cereals I'd consider allowing past my canines, and passed onto the...other stuff. I tried them all, honestly I did. Muesli, Special K, Special K with Red Bits (ironically the red fruity bits made it worse). See, I think eating should be fun and not a chore. It was tough for me to swallow this stuff let alone want to eat it on a regular basis.

So I pretty much carried on eating what I wanted. I just tried to cut down on the biscuits and surplus chocolate and cake I was eating. Which worked for a bit until the withdrawal symptoms started. My inner demon was unleashed. A woman without HRT had nothing on me.

The following picture is of a judge on Canada's Next Top Model (the wife's current obsession):

Firstly, I should point out that this is indeed a female of the species. I'm no Sistine Chapel myself but what the hell is this abomination doing judging modelling??

Job Done

And yay he said for the slavery of DIY had passed - two weeks to the day after I started. I have: sanded, painted (ceiling, walls, coving, skirting), created new bedroom cupboards and laid a very expensive wooden floor (we couldn't - or should I say the wife couldn't - find one cheaper that matched). Photos shall be forthcoming.

I've just turned off the bore that is Sahara. My love for films is waning. I used to be able to sit through any old tripe and find some sort of enjoyment. These days I struggle to sit through most. I judge a films quality on how long it takes me to check how much time has passed. Tellingly, I have no clock near me at the moment. Except on my laptop but I couldn't see it as I was watching the film. Anyway, Sahara = tripe. Here endeth my review.

I feel remiss in not having mentioned my black cat, Nana. She has now been missing for 11 days (assuming I finish typing in the next fifteen minutes or it'll be 12 days). The wife is distraught. No longer are we being woken in the night, to come in or to go out. No longer are we blanked. Our other cat, Alfie, has actually become more loving. So, just benefits really then. It's strange not hearing her cries though. I miss the penetrativeness of them (I'm surprised to find that 'penetrativeness' is actually a word). I miss the mice she brings home. Sometimes the mice even make it over the door threshold but more often are eviscerated before that point, being left for me to clear up the next day. How I used to love that sight first thing in the morning. So an Ode, to Nana:

Oh, Nana
How I miss you so
Though you bugged me to fuckery
I never thought you'd go

Oh, Nana
You're not a clever cat
How I hope that
You've not gone 'splat'

Oh, Nana
Come home soon
Nana let us hear just once more
Your crying at the moon

You may notice how no features are apparent except the eyes. She's like a feline black hole - you can only tell she's there due to the lack of the surrounding colour.

The adventures of Kate - part 678

The story so far:- My sister-in-law 'Kate', lives with her fiance 'Ben' and their two cats, Tiki and Jackson.

Or they did until Jackson was brutally dragged for half a mile down the road by a car. Someone that happened to be passing phoned to say they'd found the cat 'in a bit of a state' IE 'carcass' would be stretching the definition - bloody mess might be more accurate but slightly too graphic for a PG rated blog. Which this isn't - there were blood and guts everywhere gor blimey guvnor.

The cat was scraped off the tarmac and placed with much care into a Tesco carrier bag (although probably not a 10p one - more likely a free one cuz they're tight like that. I hope there was no 'spillage' through the holes onto the car seats...) and driven home where he was duly buried. Aah.

The next day they got a new cat. Just like that. As grieving processes go it's not bad is it? I can't help wondering what their secret is. It's good to know that if my wife died tomorrow, I'd be shacked up again by the time the weekend's over. I'll have the sporty model please. (This is in no way a reference to fit tennis players. Or swimmers. Hmm. Bikinis.)

Since she's had the new kitten, 'Kate' seems to have developed another medical condition. Having been relieved of her epilepsy, she now has something else which requires her not to work - Frozen Shoulder syndrome. She's in pain but won't take painkillers. She wanted a hot water bottle, so 'Ben' called us and spoke to the wife (he won't talk to me as he knows I think he's a cock) and asked her if I could go buy one. I hasten to point out: 'Kate' wasn't dying, was in no way in a serious condition and my wife is far worse every minute of the day and yet I still find myself able to leave the house.

I have no respect for either of them. And 'Kate''s got fat anyway.

Easy Like Monday Morning

My god it's early. I've already been awake for over an hour. In no way am I pointing the finger of blame at the wife but you should know it's all her fault.

She currently has insomnia, so by default, so do I. We have this little game we play: she wakes me up to tell me she's awake and I pretend to listen. Eventually of course it just gets annoying and we end up being testy. Today we ended up just getting up. It's amazing how light it is at half past five in the morning.

Later today (at least...counts...six hours away. Six??) we'll be going to look at yet more wooden flooring in the hope of being able to sleep in our bedroom once more. By rights you should buy it, let it sit for 24 hours, lay it and let it sit for another 24 hours meaning, if we buy it today, we shouldn't be in until Thursday at the earliest. Something IE the wife tells me that this won't be the way things happen. She'll be whip-cracking-away the minute we get in the door. As I'm a laminate laying virgin I may be finished by Friday. If this is the case I'll also be a eunuch by Friday.

Perhaps the insomnia and bedroom are related. The wife worries about so many things it's hard to keep track of her current stresses, so it's not outside the bounds of possibility. Pity this has been going on for months. She took a sleeping tablet once. She eventually woke up three days later. Happy memories.

I Got Served

See them dark clouds on the horizon? That would be the wife. She found me out like a prize-winning beagle. She found this blog. Hello Darling! We had 'words' earlier so thus forever more, my blog shall be a sanitised version of it's former potty-mouthed self. Henceforth my posts will resemble:

Flowers. Aren't they pretty? Aah yellows and pinks. Hmm. Nicey nice...

Please feel free to not return, don't pass GO and save yourself the effort (and possibly your lunch).

I did 'A Good Thing' today. In my decorating phase, having finished the paint job - two colours (count 'em) - I set to work on our bedroom wardrobes. I've ripped out the innards like a Hannibal Lecter type freak. In it's place I put up extra poles for my wife's clothes and I had the little bit in the corner. There's shelves and everything. Mother would have been proud. Not. Pictures shall be forthcoming when I can be arsed to faff around with the camera.

The search for a flooring solution continues - 100 B&Q staff when surveyed said NUH ERRRR.

Having been left comments in my post 'No readership', thus proving I have at least two readers, I've come to the opinion I sound like a whiny runt (Rhyming slang? Possibly). Henceforth The Quest shall be ended. In public anyway.

I'm now off to change all names on the blog. Not that I've been ordered to or anything...


Derren Brown writes me love letters

Still?

The decorating continues at a snails pace. Today I put up a new pendant light fitting. In a slothlike two and a half hours. Even then I had to phone my brother-in-law for help.

A Sudden Decision

Spontaneous decisions aren't my wife and I's forte (Bad english? Who cares). Well, for me it is. My motto is "Don't dither, do". Wifey can't make a decision to save a kipper from someone's breakfast though. Until yesterday.

Up she got (read: sitting on the edge of the bed while I fannied around). She asks "Is it me, or does this carpet create more dust than the wooden floor we used to have?". I disagreed, it wasn't her and the carpet was a hotbed of dust activity. Well, no sooner could you say hot-diggity than we were pulling the carpet up to gaze at the beautiful floorboards beneath. Gorgeous they were. Apart from the million splodges of paint all over them. So today, as well as having a pub lunch, I spent forty pounds at Homebase on various paint removal and sanding gear. Didn't work. Laminate it will be.

The next few days I shall be slaving away painting, sanding, and flooring. Think of me.

No readership?

As no-one has replied to my previous post, am I to take it I have no readers whatsoever? Am I just writing for me, to me? Maybe if I were to stop writing self-indulgent posts like this one...

I read something the other day that suggests self-publicising your blog is a bad thing - how else would you know about my words of wisdom? Silly Biffo.


Here comes the beast again.

How Lucky I Am

Yesterday I had the great privilege to do that thing beloved by Englanders everywhere: go to a static caravan on the coast. This is the wife's grandma's caravan, where my sister-in-law was staying.

I had to force the wife out of bed (anytime before midday is a struggle) at 9 (literally force - she hit the wall leaving only a small dent) to get the usual day out stress. An hours drive to St Merryn in Cornwall, a tiny hamlet near Padstowe and then did what I suspected: we sat there all day and did nothing. We could have stayed at home and done that, not spent the hour getting in the wife's chair, nor the hour driving there - that's two hours someone owes me, never mind the drive back the same day.

God it was frustrating listening to my mother-in-law (for she was there too - huzzah!) making little comments to which I'm not allowed to respond. It was fun trying to get the wife toileted though. Carrying her through the caravan doors which are narrower than my shoulders, into a bathroom the size of a postage stamp (mind her legs!) was tricky to say the least.

Still, days out with family - gotta love 'em.

Shocking

Think of an image. Think of another. Did either of those come anywhere to the image of Eddie Izzard in a micro kilt? This is the image Carol Vorderman has just put forth on Countdown. He apparently asked to try it on after seeing Carol wearing it. With that fresh in your mind let's move on...

To the film I saw at the cinema recently: Sunshine. Can't be bothered to write too much about it (go read a review!) but I thought it was much better than certain quarters have suggested. After reading the SFX forum thread though, I may have missed bits. The missing bits made the film work for me though, so who cares?

If you search for 'wee' and 'smell' I'm first on Google after the BBC.

Womble, on a bike.

See? Over there? ----->

A new Sight Wat I Lyke. Aprosexic has taken advantage of my rather generous link exchange program. God bless him (?) and God bless all atheists everywhere.

A Young Man's Passage

AKA Julian Clary's autobiography. Did you know he was gay? You would if you read this. My god the man was a slut! Are all gay men the same?? Speaking as a purely hetero male, I've got no problem with a man wanting to sleep with as many women as he wants and have to consider the possibiliy that double the blokes doubles the horniness. Jeez. Like shaggin'? Turn gay. Most of Julian's conquests seem to enforce the stereotype of homosexuals as screaming, bitchy queens.

The book goes a bit deeper than that and is literally painfully funny (his pain, not the readers). I don't normally read biographies, especially those of celebrities but a) I thought it was a novel b) it was three quid in HMV and c) I was struggling to spend a ten pound gift voucher. I'm glad I did. Despite the nauseating in-your-face (quite literally for Julian at one point, answering the door with last night's jizzum all over himself) gayness of it, it is a very funny book. It shows how these entertainer folk start with Tarzan-a-grams and elevate to TV land.

It's a good thing it was funny as it also dwells on many of Julian's darker moments i.e. 98% of his life, including the death of his soul-mate Christopher through AIDS. All in all a very revealing book on many subjects I wouldn't normally touch. Bargepoles at the ready.

Melon Farmers

Some people IE bastardy tits call me workshy. This is as nothing however compared to farmers wanting, nay demanding compensation for their cows getting TB . This to me seems to be like asking for money for old rope.

Is not your animal getting a disease a hazard of the job? My cat is currently sick, yet I don't go complaining to T. Blair for her vet money. Not only would I get summarily thrown out but I'd be laughed at. Farmers join nurses on my all time 'sucking the government dry' list.

On a happier note, last month I had 261 unique visitors according to Statcounter and 364 page loads. Those 261 may be the same 10 people with a different IP address everyday but still, not bad. If of course it's a true and accurate figure, about 258 people have visited and not left a comment! Why? Is it not true that you get a warm feeling in your heart in the knowledge of a well written response? So, for now and this time only, leave a comment and give me a true census. I love you all. Except the ones that smell of wee, obviously.

PS I've been found on a search engine with the phrase "treating needle track marks and bruises" - eh? Explain that if you can.

Super Blogger

It's a funny thing having an online identity. I used to go by the name 'Damnation' on newsgroups; now I go by the more confident 'jstarbuck' (for 'tis me). Many people aren't even who they say they are (shock! horror!) going so far as to change gender and sexual orientation (go on, have cybersex as the opposite sex in a gay relationship). It never occurred to me though to hide 'me' from the wife.

I left a comment on Scaryduck's blog today comparing my wife, as a joke, to a Nazi. Did you see the mushroom cloud? There surely was one. After five years of marriage my wife a) really needs to learn my sense of humour and b) get one for herself. I felt somewhat affronted. Let alone it was a joke, this was my internet identity I was displaying - what relevance should it have on the 'real world'? A lot apparently. All day long she's been harping on, wanting to know in what way I was comparing her to a Nazi. I should have said it was her persistent extraction of information via inhumane methods but she might not have understood that. One final thing, it was a joke! Good job she never saw my acronym for my job title: Slave To A Bitch.

NB Godwin's Law is irrelevant in this case.

Prison Break - series 2

The second season has now closed in the States with a WTF?? moment. Possibly the biggest of all time.

From the beginning of the season things have failed to reach the exciting heights generated by the first. Michael and Lincoln bounce from here to there for illogical and unclear reasons. Everywhere they go they're followed like a puppy by William Fichtner's oh-so-clever FBI agent, Alex Mahone and it just gets tiresome. Mr Kim, the face of the evil 'Company' gets more like a Paontomine Dame with every episode; to his credit he doesn't cackle. He does have the most smug face in the world though.

And the ending seems to have been written purely with a third season in mind. And is frankly, shite.

US TV Networks - keepers of ineptitude

121 pints

I know some of you are hoping I'm going to be talking about lager but no.

A channel 4 program, Human Footprint, has listed the cost to the planet of a human life and one statistic stands out for me (of those I saw in the advert anyway - there's no way I'm actually going to watch). Apparently, in the course of your life, not mine cuz I'm a double hard bastard (DHB), you will shed 121 pints of tears. No, really.

Glossing over how this could possibly be measured and massive differences between people eg the aforementioned DHB and hormonal pregnant women, who the hell could cry that much? That's about two pints a year! Poke me in the eye continuously and I wouldn't be able to do it. It might be just about possible with a particularly toxic nerve gas. Tear gas, maybe.

And so, a list of things to make your eyes water:

The Goodies on their three-way bike, stopping all of a sudden and landing balls first on the crossbar.
Extreme hayfever. (Should be a sport - throw a bit more pollen on me ya bastards!).
Wind from the north-west. On a Thursday. In Dorset.

And that's it. Suggestions appreciated.


Earthquake in Kent kills sperm

On Stupidity

Jeez. Some people just don't know they've been booted out of their mother's crotch. They think life will always be cosy and warm, little realising reality is gonna come and bite them on the scrotum. Of course, some people, like Pete Docherty, openly invite it by being a twunt. Others, think that however foolish they act, whatever obscenity they perform, they'll always be number one. And it is about these people that I shall be speaking about today. Or rather, one of them.

His name is Keven Federline. Coming from nowhere, K-Fed, as he is now stupidly known, met and married Britney Spears during her thin and gorgeous phase, having two children (let's not forget that for this he must have seen her naked and possibly had her sitting on his face) and money thrown at him left, right, centre and up the behind. All he had to do to continue sitting pretty, was keep her happy. But no. K-Fed got drunk, saw strippers and slept around. I pause at this moment to scream 'allegedly'. He must have been off his tits on drugs. The evidence? Go read this paragraph again. Someone commit the eejit to an asylum for the criminally twuntish.

Surely it can't have been hard to have fun with Britters? Great body, obviously up for fun, not at all tight with her money...no, let's go get some 'ho. Tit.



Don't forget Dylan's canine credentials

On Blog Dither

Not relevant to what follows but my nipples are hurting as I type this.

Reading other peoples blogs you get a sense that there aren't half some (self) worthy people in the world. See Big News, write Serious Discussion Piece (no joking at the back). I've been wondering if I should adopt a similar tone now and again. Rather than the bollox I write at the minute that is. (I came up with a great joke earlier about that but it's gone...).

I just can't help writing my stream of consciousness. For instance, I just have to mention I'm hungry and am dying for some chocolate (someone help me beat down my craving - It's entirely possible 'm pregant looking at the size of my belly) and on it goes.

So I'll leave the weighy stuff to others; I'm quite happy here on the Islands of made up Bollox. (That's the one on the left I'm on; the one on the right is slightly higher up.)

Blog of the moment

Sheryl Crow is the talk of most blogs at the moment. I won't be jumping on this bandwagon as I think she's full of crap.

The Quest - an update

My quest for blog domination continues unabated and unabandoned. Mr Chipen Dale has agreed to swap links (definitely no bodily fluid though). Get in.

The American Middle Class

I was watching Slither tonight (Nathan Fillon's vehicle to stardom - not gonna happen, dude) and it occured to me that America has two kinds of people - the super-rich and the immensely poor. Let's look at the evidence.

On the one hand you have a family depicted by their trailer, their disgustingly tacky decor and their redneck attitudes.

On the other, an open plan living room with the kitchen of my dreams set in grounds.

There is nowhere in between. Land of the free? My arse.

Is Lost losing it's credentials?

Many things are allowed to change. Some blend and yet more mutate into monstrosities or into swans. One thing that isn't and certainly shouldn't, is genre programming. This is my domain goddammnit and it should not be sullied by namby pamby normal things happening.

When Lost started it had questions galore, all of which it was implied had supernatural explanations: the plane crash, how the Island came into being, the others, the monster, even the frickin' button. There were theories of time travel, magnetic anomalies, of quantum flux and many more. None were denied by JJ Abrams or Damon Lindelof, the shows creators. In fact, people were encouraged to believe.

Most of the questions have now been answered and there's a perfect rationale for it all! OK there're some bizarre happenings (which I won't go into for those not near the end of series three) but, and I feel stronlgy about this, although it's still a great program, I feel I was dragged into addiction on false pretences. This wouldn't happen in the other direction. Pauline Fowler wouldn't take off her skin to reveal her family crash landed twenty years ago from planet Suifge. No right minded SF fan would suddenly start watching. In fact, it would lose viewers.

I demand we all stop watching until they bring back the SF trappings! So say we all.

My mentalist dog is a tree.

Third post of the day...

to say I've had an email from Dave Bradley of SFX. As a result of having a letter in the next magazine, I've won another book! I truly am blessed.

Readers

My ratings are gradually increasing. Hurrah.

If you like my blog, you may wish to send me money. Please feel free. At the very least you could link to my blog and in return get linked back (which is obviously a highly sought after commodity).

I am a Sci Fi Orphan

Things are equal in the battle of the sexes. The Neanderthal men have gone back to their caves dragging their Barbie by the ankle (swinging might be a better image...or perhaps not). Women are now equal in so many things I can't think of a single one. Maybe you could leave a comment to suggest one (go on. Please.) Women however don't go quite the same way. They believe us men should equal. As long as we're separate. Aah, good memories of apartheid.

My wife is a fan of all kinds of crap TV. Soaps, docudramas, Little Biddy Animals Being Rescued, almost anything to do with babies and well, shite. Amazingly not all of it is on ITV. Like a Lord of all she surveys (not that she could actually survey anything per se having the intelligence of [insert your own item here]) she has her TV Land schedule mapped out from dawn to dusk, Monday to Sunday. IN fact, what's on TV is pretty much the way and why we keep track of what day it is, each blending into the next to make a big gelatinous lump of beige days.

The perceptive among you will be asking the question "But Jamie, when do you watch your programming?". Thanks for asking. I watch my genre and 'special' programming in the small hours of my wife's bedtime and in the time when she isn't on MSN with her sister and I've finished my scrubbing for the day (which she does check on). I look forward to the days that she's ill and has to spend time in bed or go there early.

This is normally a 'good and fruitful' plan. Thursday was a bad day for it to fall on though. This is the day of Chaos at the Castle and Sea of Souls. So I wasted this valuable extra time watching the same TV as the wife. I can't help feeling she planned it that way.

My Life's Aim

LIving with my wife gives a unique perspective.

She has a 'shortened lifespan'. Like a lot of things it's akin to The Iron Man. How long will she live? Nobody knows. How will she die? Nobody knows. Will it be vastly unpleasant? Almost certainly.

For most of the forthcoming years, she'll spend a large proportion in some sort of discomfort. Hold your breath for twenty seconds, breathe for five and hold it again. Repeat ad nauseum. This is her day-to-day existence. Being her carer allows me to see first hand what a shitty stick we're all handed. Which begs the question why most people are happy to sit (or stand) doing a job that has the consequence of making other people money. Think about it: that woman in Tesco behind the check-out - she might make six quid an hour. Lord of Tesco probably makes that in less than a minute. But still she slaves away every day struggling to make enough to feed her kids, not forgetting copious amounts of nicotine obviously. She's gotta have some pleasures after all. (Hear me scoffing? Anyway...).

So, when my missus packs her bags, to pass over the coil that is mortal, I in theory should have to find a job. Which I am not going to want to do. Over and above the fact I spend my days doing a bit of DIY, sitting drinking tea and eating biscuits, reading, watching TV and generally being a lazy arsed shit (in between bits of care for the wife) do you really think I'm going to get up early, slave away 9-5, miss the great sunshine (which I'm missing by the way to type this, you ungrateful twunts) and make money for someone else? Am I arse.

My plan is thus, and forgive me if this sounds callous but it's always been my dream so get stuffed:

Grieve.
Buy a tent.
Buy a push bike.
Sell house and worldly possessions (at current reckoning about £90,000 based on profit from my house, minus mortgage, car, savings and other bits).
Travel.

When I travelled in 2000 I spent about 12k a year, and most of that was on hostels. I reckon I could get by on 8k a year or about £21 a day. A bit less if did any attractions.

My question to you is this: which direction?

North: Scotland? Always wanted to see it but once there where do you go?
East: France, Europe, the Far East: nicely varied but full of foreign speaking oiks.
West: Ireland and then a ferry to the US and Canada, trailing down to South America. This is my current favourite choice.

Make your case.

Bald Britney with Lyndsay Lohan getting a mohican. On a rope.

Do you smell like wee?

Is it you I sit next to on the bus?

With the face made of pus?

Is it you in the street?

With the honkin' size 12 feet?

WELL HAVE A FRICKIN' WASH!

God I hate having to smell other people. Having someone smoke in the same atmosphere as me is bad enough but to invade my personal air space with their dirty genital smells is, frankly, disgusting. Have these people heard of toilet paper? If you smell of wee do you, by default, smell of pooh? After all, if you don't wipe one way why wipe the other?

Obviously the general stereotype is for this to afflict the older generation. Fair enough, if your arthritis affects you so much you can't hold a really very lightweight piece of paper between your decrepit fingers but for the majority of the population it's really not too hard. I assume. I may be unique in that I'm the only person capable of wiping my knob on the curtains, for there must be endless opportunities for self-cleansing.

Ever been on a train when someone whiffy gets on? It's bad enough on a bus and that's for relatively short distances. A train can take you to the other side of the country, all the time next Micturating Mike. Excuse me Mike but are you wearing a frickin' nappy? Ever heard of femfresh?

I'd like all readers to do the following (and perhaps even leave a comment telling me how you got on - this shall be an amnesty and all charges shall be cancelled forthwith):

If you've been stinking for awhile you may not even notice the smell anymore. So ask someone. Pluck up the courage and ask a complete stranger to smell you. Not the wife, the husband or the mother (God bless 'er). They'll never see you again. Don't ask this guy though:

A Blog's life

What? Half hour later? 260 words! Piece of micturation juice this. Time for a break. KIT KAT!

See Compo, will enter

I've decided to enter, or at least try to enter, SFX's Pulp Idol competition.

I started last year with some guff about a wandering space family but ran out of steam at about 600 words. This year I have a killer idea and should easily get a thousand words; my concept is easily split up into little chunks which in total should get me there. Here's dreaming.

I'd love a writing career - I have high opinions on my use of that there grammar. My downfall though is written speech. I might be able to do it but it's such a ball ache. So and so said that, he replied sarcastcally...blah. My 'great idea' (patent here I come) is to not have any. My story will be written entirely in the second person and my character shall talk to no-one. Which is actually integral to the story. This will be The Greatest Story Ever Told. Which is a hint.

I'm a winner!

Today isn't quite so awful as ususal - I've been picked by SFX Magazine to win a full set of the Runelords series! No information has been released as to how I've been picked (echoes of Richard and Judy if you ask me) but I have been leaving lots of mesages of lurve for Ian Berriman, Deputy Editor and chief picker on the mag. I've entered loads of these things and to suddenly win like this can't be entirely coincidental.

I was always arguing with HBK on the SFX forum and elsewhere about, well, many things, but relevantly about my sycophantic naturedness where free stuff was concerned. Hell, now I know it works I'll be IB's bitch media whore. Give it to me Ian. Give it to me good. Any remote control Daleks lying around?


|Corned beef and pickle

On my unknown celebrity status

6th July 2002. That was the date of my nuptials. The day my freedom ended and my life as a eunuch-with-a-penis IE a husband started. 'Twas a great day, with not one bit of vomit and even my sister-in-law only threw a single strop (over her hair). I'd go so far as to say the cliched happiest day of my life. We went to Mexico on honeymoon. Aaah. Hot and sweaty it was. So was the weather. Fnarr, Fnarr.

When we got back a parcel was waiting for us - the wedding video. God, I thought, I'm gonna have to watch this a hundred times as we go around the relatives. If I knew what it contained I'd have burned it with petrol.

Picture the scene: my mother-in-laws living room - many people jammed in front of the TV waiting for the forthcoming feature. It starts. And there standing nee bouncing is Mr Bean. Alas, no. It is I. I'd previously been unaware of the similarity but the evidence was conclusive. OK I'd always been quite good at putting on silly voices and acting a twat but was a joke; I hadn't realised that was normality compared to my normal self. It now gets mentioned ad nauseam at every opportunity. I'm just glad we haven't had kids; every year on it's birthday I'd have had to check for the symptoms (presuming these things are genetic): silly walk? Check. Silly voice? Not yet thank god. Bad style? Just like me.

The Quest - an update

Back when I first got the Internet (seems so long ago...what did we do all day??) I spent most of time and bandwidth downloading programs to make my downloading faster. Kinda pointless really.

Now I'm doing this blog thing properly I seem to be spending most of online time just promoting this site, trying to get bloody readers - you shall read me goddamnit!

On a trawl of other blogs yesterday I noticed Smeg_Head has linked to me - he never said! It came as quite a shock to be honest as I thought he couldn't stand me (let's face it - few people can), him being a regular on the SFX forum. Maybe it's the teacher in him. How anyone finds his blog I don't know; if you look up Smeg Head on Google you just find information on Red Dwarf.

It also came as a shock to find the link as I did a Google back link search and it said not a single link was out there to be found. Which is blatantly rubbish. I now feel the need to publicise Smeg_Head too...

A Rose that is a Rose is still a Pain

Shakespeare apparently said many wise things but none more stupid than 'A rose is but a Rose' *. See, if your name's Smith it's probable that you don't get asked about it's origin, you don't get bombarded with comments along the lines of 'Do you own the well known newsagents?'

I used to work in a call centre selling advertising for the local paper; it was a good job. I liked it. Apart from the telephone work. There I'd be in my preamble, trying to get the bloke on the other end of the phone to actually talk to me (No! No, thanks! I'm dead! etc etc) and the moment would come when I'd mention my name - "Starbuck? Like the coffee?" Yes, like the bloody coffee. No, I don't have shares. No, it's not a relation. No, I don't actually like coffee. No, it's named after a character from Moby Dick.

Or the other famous connotaton - "Starbuck? The cylons didn't get you then?" Oh, watch me chortle.

You might think it's not that bad but I get it everywhere I go: petrol stations, shops, National Rail Enquiries, Insurance firms, hospitals. I could have three conversations a day that follow the exact same pattern. How I yearn to sometimes be a 'Smith'.

* May not actually be correct.

Spasm is a five letter word

Inventions that need to be invented #1

Forget about flying cars, forget about Star Wars type Speeders, forget even about those anti-gravity barge type things in Star Trek: TNG. The perfect use for this technology is a floating washing basket.

How many times have you done for your back when pegging out clothes? Up, down, up, down, getting some potentially very heavy towels. I'd buy one of these tomorrow if I could. If anyone is on the verge of production and is looking for an investor my email address is over there ---->

The problem with BSG

This is a great article on where BSG is currently going wrong. It's not often I don't find something to disgaree with...

Carnivale

I finally got around to finishing watching Carnivale recently - the full and interrupted two seasons. It was cancelled at the end of season two; such a travesty has never been committed. Especially if you ignore memories of Dark Skies, American Gothic and Invasion.

It centred on a young man called Ben Hawkins, played with sublime subtlety by Nick Stahl, he of Terminator 3 infamy. Ben became an orphan in the first episode and was picked up by a travelling fair, the 'Carnivale', that came with a rag-tag bunch of misfits, charlatans and, for want of a better word, freaks. It was set during the thirties in the US of A and pretty much every frame emphasised just how dirty everything was. From the people to the towns, muck was endemic in every day life (if this show's accurate it's a tale of Lazarus proportions how they got to the shiny, spangly, gaudy situation they're in today).

They travelled the 'circuit' up and down the 'States trying to make a quick buck before people got bored of their wares or as in one spectacular case, died, leading to a highly graphic tar and feathering. Can you spell 'ouch'?

Intermittently cut in were scenes of a preacher, Brother Justin, and his sister Iris. It soon becomes clear that BJ (as he shall henceforth be humorously known) wasn't all he seemed. Thus started the show proper. For BJ and Ben were Ying to each others Yang, it not being conclusively clear on which side they lay. They developed supernatural abilities (sounds corny, it's not) during the first season; Ben could use his to heal people and BJ could...do pretty much what he wanted. They'd dream of each other, of some bloke called Hank/Hack Scudder, of WWII and a tree of all things. Entwined in all this were the secondary characters of which there were an army (rumour suggests the cost of keeping them all on was the primary reason for the shows cancellation - have the US networks not heard of art for arts sake?? - instead we get Tracey Emin and a dirty bed. Nice trade.) all under the eye of 'Management' a shadowy figure confined to a trailer in the Carnivale ranks.

As season 2 wore on the tables were being set for an almighty confrontation between BJ and Ben and there were revelations galore, Management seemingly being way more involved than even the viewer could have guessed. People died, some even died and then lived again. The series ended on such a shocking moment, a revelation in all senses of the word that to never have a resolution is a crime.

It made for one of the best-looking series ever made, by which I mean the production values not the state of the cast for some of them were outright fugly. Not one of them would have been in a beauty pageant, which is why they're probably character actors and boy do they have character. Not one aspect of the show was poor; it was uniformly excellent: the acting, the direction, the scripts, the music. You must see this show.

To Dog or Not to Dog

Man's best friend....Dog? Don't think so! That'd be cash. Cash for the wife, cash for the kids cash for the new technogadgetry. Hmm. Cash.

But dogs're alright too. I'd always thought that if I won the lottery I'd buy a BIG house and then I'd also have time for dog walking (which has got nothing to do with having a house of any size but there you go). So I'd buy a dog. Which is a problem. See, I've always wanted a St Bernard (pronounced to rhyme with 'would' not 'hard' for my American readers (see my ambition? - American readers)) as they look like a dog you could literally fight with and it a) wouldn't give a toss and b) wouldn't fight back. But then my neighbour has a Weimerauner and they're gorgeous and such good fun so I'd have to have one. And have you ever had the pleasure to be in the company of a Cocker Spaniel? Such a stupid dog but you can watch one all day without getting bored. Alsatian? Always wanted one of those. Pyrennese Mountain Dog? Ever since I saw a children's TV program....And the list goes on.

So how could you choose between them? Is it greedy or selfish to have them all? I ask because I have Saturdays winning ticket. I had one last week too but they pulled out the wrong numbers...

My cat is feline fine

Dangerous Substances

Hmm. Drugs. There are many that are dangerous that aren't on the wicked list (that's wicked bad not wicked 'mint'), many that aren't dangerous but are and others that have never been considered. You often come in to contact with them in day to day life. I did earlier in fact (as if you hadn't guessed).

We went to Tesco earlier in the week, part of the wife's health drive (not that it's helping her lower end problems). Wahey we went on the 'fresh' fruit and veg section. (See the ''''? That's cuz 'fresh' is a complete fuckin' misnomer especially if you shop at Asda. It's off by the time you get to the car, let alone three days later.) Bit a this, bit a that, hmm feel those melons. I even bought a Pineapple for the first time in my life; that was fun I can't tell you. We intended on making smoothies of strawberry and bananananan and raspberries. We got at least half way through before my blender broke. I estimate we threw away about fifteen pounds worth of fruit that otherwise isn't edible and you can double that when you factor in how much of the stuff we did manage to make hasn't been touched by the wife.

Amongst the more 'obscure' items we bought were some chillies. I'm a bit of a gastro-amateur when it comes to food which translates as: pick a meat, throw it in a pan and throw other stuff in at random. And so this was my technique tonight. Except I planned on pasta instead of meat. Tin of tomatoes, red pepper, garlic, red onion and one of my chillies. Let the pain commence.

There I am chopping away thinking to myself of all the stories of the useless twunts that have chopped chillies and rubbed their eyes. Ho ho ho I very nearly verbalised. Then I got distracted. I hadn't done the wife's baked beans! Ooh, my eye is itching, scratch OMFG fuck fuckity dwarf on a barge someone has inserted a blow torch in my eye akin to the oriental bird in Hostel.

It hurt. A lot. I don't have a pain threshold. I have a pain switch. At the 'off' position all is tranquil. At 'on' it's like Jack Bauer is inserted in my mutha lovin' brain.

I literally fell up the stairs to the bathroom ( I was stood three feet from the kitchen sink but my instincts led me stumbling up the frickin' stairs) and eventually managed to dab it with a tea towel. Didn't work. The wife suggested cotton pads. Didn't work. All this time I was worried about my culinary creation which may have been burning. Eventually I got in the shower and stood with my eye under the shower. Fifteen minutes later the blow torch had been replaced with a single solitary match. And a football had been inserted under my eye (a euphemism for swelling). I can now see again but I may have to change my name to John Merrick for the foreseeable future.

My pasta was lovely by the way.

Pigs are happy when flagellating

Serenity Sheep

SFX have been running a poll to find the 'greatest SF film ever', including such alumni as Blade Runner, Aliens and The Terminator and little known fan film Serenity.

The latter film for those that don't know is based on the series Firefly, created by Joss 'In Search of a Success' Whedon. It's about the criminal crew of a rundown spaceship (the Firefly) and their adventures throughout known space (apparently one system wide but with an amazing array of survivable habitats). It's not a bad series as such and some characters are better than others, Jayne being the male stand-out from the crowd. He has the best, funniest, lines and is lower on the IQ chart than a piece of crotch crust. River is at the opposite end of the likability scale. She's nutso when you first meet her and doesn't contribute to the show except to how how crazy she is. The only exception being Objects in Space, where it appears she is absorbed by the ship. This would have been one of the great SF twists. As it is she was just on another ship. Meh.

It had the potential to be one of the better show of recent years; not up there with Babylon 5 but certainly on a par with the 4400. It lasted thirteen episodes before being cancelled. 13. One and three. Joss Whedon's fans, and if you like one of his shows you're pretty much likely to obsess about them all for some unknown except to bum fluff reason, come up with plenty of reasons for it being cancelled, all of them irrelevant and fatuous. Quite how a film was ever made I'll never know.

As soon as the poll appeared on the main SFX site, threads appeared on the Buffy and Firefly websites enrolling people to vote for Serenity. They do this every time one of their number appears somewhere on the net or on a vote-me-up somewhere. I'm getting to the point now and the point is this: get a life. Not in a William Shatner tongue in cheek type way but really, get a life. The show was cancelled quite a long time ago now. OK you must find a way to fill your after school time but go ride your bike, buy some binoculars and perve on the old lady across the street (I do - she's lush) or even help your Gran in the garden (the grass gets right in her Petunia when Grandad wants to do some trimming of her hedge).

It's not even as if Joss Whedon has had a single successful project since Buffy and even that is considered to be shite after series 4 (I personally never saw the 'brilliance' in that show either). Off the top of my head (cuz that makes a) my pop culture knowledge seem wizzo and b) there's nothing better for Blog kudos credibility) let's have a rundown of Jw's work and chart his successeseseses:

Toy Story - according to modern myth he wrote, created, starred and directed. In fact he co-wrote a few lines.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - seven series TV show that limped a bit after the fourth.

Angel - Below average BTVS spinoff that got cancelled after the third season.

Firefly - Thirteen episodes! Count them and come back in...less than 10!

Serenity - Film based on Firefly that is struggling two years later to recoup it's cost.

Wonder Woman - a new film he was developing. Until he got chucked off.

I await the next announcement in SFX of his 'latest exciting project'.

Light Dawns on Marble Head

I like to think I'm pretty tech savvy. I like to think I'm fairly well endowed in the intelligence department. And I also like to think that I'm not the doofus I actually appear to be.

I converted to the new blogger, ooh, ages ago. Regular readers will know what a chore-bore that was, it being a nightmare of Homeric proportion. I was just glad to get it finished. Well apparently I never did. I was flicking around this morning and realised I hadn't installed the code for my Page Counter - DOH! No wonder I've been registering as having no readers these past few...ages. Rest assured your efforts shall not go unheeded anymore.




Lindsay Lohan sitting in a tree

Doctor Who 3x01 "Smith and Jones"

So Nu Hu bounces back onto UK screens and it does so with a swagger, a jape and a knowing wink that it's already been commissioned for a fourth series. Which is why Russell T Davies seems to have followed through on his promise to not change a single thing.

Think back to the release of Oasis' third album. The expectation was massive and although the fans (like me!) thought it was great, the critics decided it was just too much of the same, identical to the first two albums. The third series of Doctor Who is following the same tack...except that SFX, Europe's best selling science fiction magazine, still appears to be kneeling in front of RTD with mouth agape. Still, I await the results of the forum vote.

This may be the year that I stop watching. There's only so many dysfunctional families that you can watch in a childrens SF show setting. Like Smallville it may develop into an event-episode watch only: the inevitable Dalek episode; the rumoured Master episode and the series end.

See, even the much-publicised "first black companion" (Sorry Mickey. You've been forgotten about) for which RTD can strike off another minority tickbox, can do something to shake up the program. Most programs in their third series have a shift away from where they were; think BSG stranding themselves on New Caprica. In introducing Martha Jones, a capable enough actress with a sort-of likeableness, you can't help imagining it's just Rose with brains. Which wouldn't be so bad if other things had changed for the better - RTD's way of writing 'generic female companion isn't too bad by itself - but all the usual Nu Hu tick boxes were marked in the very first episode: London? Check! Mouthy family? Check! Stupid people? Check! Sonic screwdriver used as regular mcguffin? Check! Contemporary setting? Check!

Let us not forget this is a program that can go anywhere in space and time - we should be seeing new weapons not gun analogues, new planetary vistas not...what we get, undescribable aliens not anthropods with dodgy voice changers, concepts, ideas - something to make you think! This is a kids program after all and surely it's remit should be to challenge the future generation, not to convince them that London is the place to go see spaceships?

6/10

List of words

This will not be a lengthy post. Or one that's probably even worth reading. If you've made it this far I don't want to see you following me, asking for these thirty seconds of your life back, ok?

This is a big, gopping list of words that I liked the look of. I'm also hoping that a google search might be confused. Here's hoping.

The Common Garden Oik

I'm not a nice person. This has been acknowledged on quite a few occasion including the time I alluded to my maths lecturers weight problem by shouting to the entire class that it wasn't possible for her to be under twenty stone. Beetroot? She was. I just sat there larfing and larfing...Hi Beverley by the way (Peoples College, Maid Marian Way, Nottingham for anyone that wants to enquire after her rotund wellbeing). I like to think I have standards though; I'd happily punch a woman given enough of a pummeling by one but I'd help her stand after.

But not even I'd stoop so low as to SWEAR IN FRONT OF THE MOTHER-IN-LAW.

This has got to be the most heinous of crimes. Murder cannot compare. Paedophilia? A mere trifle. See, it's not hard to continue my status of Golden Boy when you have my brother-in-law. He's the kind of person that tells his obnoxious six year-old daughter to tell other people to F*** off "cuz it's funny". Yeah, that's funny. See in twenty years that your daughter is a delinqnuent drug user like you? See those needle track marks? See those bruises on her inner thigh? That's your fault that is. Harsh but true.

So later when we're at a childrens birthday party and his four year-old niece wets her knickers, he calls her a bitch. Hmm. Needle track marks.

Well, 'Kate' goes ballistic on his ass not that he cares. He comes wading into the kitchen "Aah f***, F***y, C**t". (That's known as paraphrasing). Well, I never thought eyes could actually leave one's head but my ma-in-laws certainly did. You could watch the tumble weeds glide past before another word was said...which was quite some time as we had to fight with a bread knife to get between the bickering pair. It was only later, as is the 'Jones' way, that the truth came out about how she really felt. Which wasn't exactly a surprise.

In my quest for readers I've developed a plan: I shall include phrases on all my posts that are either unique or aim for the more populist google searches eg I'd like to see Britney Spears naked (see what I did there? I got a freebie. Britney Spears? Naked? Freebie? Hmm.) This posts phrase shall be: Reticulating flange

Was The Death Star Attack an Inside Job?

Some important questions need to be answered by someone in authority. Where's your "Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime", now Blair? Eh? EH? Bloody Labour and it's workshy manifesto.

The Quest - an update

Many thanks to Scaryduck for including me in his oh so fantastic link-o-matic. It can't be long before my world domination is...to commence. Surely. Of course, it helps when you actually post to your own bloody blog but with all this free time on my hands I surely must be able to find the time...

Anger Management

I've never been one to get my ire raised easily; I'm a chilly kinda person, I hang with the 'bros and am calmer than Robin Knox-Johnston at sea. But my wife....oh dear. She is the one and only person able to do this to me. A wrong word here, even a sly glance there and faster than a fireman in a flame my tempertaure rises and my steam kettle goes BANG!

This was my downfall yesterday. Small are the arguments we have but they escalate. Massively. See, I don't see the point in arguing. It doesn't get you anywhere, it certainly doesn't make you feel any better. In fact it just serves to create bad atmosphere and increases the things for you to argue about next time. So most of the time my wife argues and I just sit there saying "Yes, dear" which of course makes her even more irate (but I can't help that). It's only three hours later when she's still going on and basically repeating the same thing over and over and over and over again that I start to get annoyed and that's mainly because I'm bored. So I'll retaliate at which point the argument shifts emphasis and what I've just said is suddenly what the argument has been about all along.

Well yesterday I lost it. Under the sofa and sewn into the lining type lost. I stormed over to her, put her wheelchair in freewheel (to no insignificant possible harm to my fingers I must say (ever tried putting your fingers between the spokes of a moving wheel?) and pushed it into the corner. There she sat for a bit until she calmed down. After she'd vented massively at the indgnity of what I'd just done obviously. Eventually, with a bit of help from our old friend Asthma, she'd managed to work up enough courage to apologise. After a bit of crying she even managed to raise a smile. Now, I asked her, was it really worth arguing about wether the cat wanted to go out in the night? I think it's clear who was in the right.

So, dear non-existant reader, what things have you been right about in the past which others failed to see?

NB: Part of this post was made up. Only part, mind.

A Woman's Mind

I'm not sure I understand this - maybe that's the point! (Click for a larger version)

Pussy Whipped

Alfie has returned! There I was cleaning my kitchen, I opened the door to take out some rubbish and in she wandered, not a care in the world. We have noticed a few changes in her behaviour, like when she goes to sleep she'll wake up in a panic and she won't be left alone and every time I leave the room she screams but apart from that...

The Hateful (nearly)dead

Aaah old people. Dontcha love 'em? Erm...no. Stinky gits the lot of 'em. Apart from my dear old Gran, bless her poor deceased cotton socks.

Spend two minutes now and name me five people over the age of 60 - apart from immediate family you have a scarily unnecessary emotional attachment to - who deserve to carry on breathing......Can't do it can you? The truth of the matter is, that despite the usual protests that these literal degenerates have amassed years of useful experience, they don't have any meaningful purpose. What do they choose to do with their collective selves? Do they go around schools explaining why they're so decrepit, telling all the innocent children where they're going wrong in life, how they managed to single-handedly win the war (if they're American obviously) or even visiting sad and lonely tossers in hospital, who, lying in cancerificly awful pain, yearn for just someone to talk to? Do they bum. (That's not a question by the way). They decide, for it is so clearly a choice, to sit and watch DAYTIME TELEVISION. Admittedly this isn't a bad thing in itself, DT being highly addictive but it's such a waste of experience...

And why should they persist in clogging up the supermarkets everyday with their urine stinkiness? If they must micturate in their clothes, surely they must have learned that one trip a week allows them to vegetate even more??

There are distinct flavours of Homo Senilis. My particular favourite is that of the female variety with "Big Bottom Disease". Much like the theory of evolution, there doesn't seem to be an intermediate stage for BBD. There goes a middle-aged lady walking down the street, with her relatively pert rear-end when she is suddenly afflicted with BBD (not that you'll ever see this happen). It must be made clear that BBD is not just for those ladies of a more...obese nature. BBD happens irrespective of general body size and is distinctly more pronounced in those who are in fact quite small. Notice how the have to lean forward to compensate for the rear weight. Notice also how the affected area can balance a tray of pint glasses, something which old women fail to appreciate, adding further credence to the argument above.

The Prestige

No spoilers shall be revealed.

The story revolves around two Paul Daniels magician types having personal and professional rivalries, helped along by one killing the wife of the other. On the one hand this is an excellent film. Christopher Nolan has put together another brilliant piece of storytelling and the two lead actors (Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale) are as fine as you could wish.

On the other hand, the final reveal is a bit...meh. I saw it coming way before the end, having been looking out for it from the word GO! which maybe spoiled the effect. Having seen countless SF&F films the ending is a bit obvious but jars with the rest of the period-set film.

9/10 (loses a point for the ending alone)

Today

Alfie is still gone. I've now given up hope of finding her. She may wander back one day by herself but the chances of me finding her are zilch. I've been out no end of times to find her but can not. Sigh.

Have you seen my pussy?

Alas, my baby has gone. Left us. Disappeared. Alfie went out on Thursday night and has not been seen since. If you see her, email me. This is the only post I have time for at the moment but more grief sharing will follow when I eventually get my house sorted - wireless broadband! WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

My Christmas List

I won't have one. I'm not drinking.

Geddit? I'm funny, me.

Action Cat

Alfie, my lovely tabby pussy cat who I dote on, has had a heart-stopping adventure. Heart stopping for me that is, she probably couldn't have cared less.

Never one to let anything faze her, Alfie lurves to explore. The day after we moved in our cats were getting on our royal tits (two weeks?? Which masochistic arse decided you should keep a cat in for two weeks when they enter a new home? They obviously never met Nana) so against the wife's express wishes (she's a real have a cake and take five extra portions kinda girl) I let them out. Wife was in bed. What did she know? It took all of two days for them to be left out over night. NB There is no bigger joy than to watch your cat in a new environment.

So, I wake up at ooh seven-ish and after the obligatory nee demanded wifey-cuddle, I toddle downstairs, remembering my slippers in case my feet freeze to the cermaic tiles on the kitchen floor. I swear, this will happen come winter. Tea and toast in hand I open the kitchen door having just rembered my err...beloved Alfie has been out in sub-zero temperatures all night. Well she's not at the door...although I can hear a distinct crying above me. Up I looks, and she's on the utility room roof, a seperate garage size construction not three feet from the back door. Unfortunately there's no where for her to easily jump down apart from a 2mm wide fence and even she's not that brave. So I runs around loking for something to stand on - eureka! thinks I, I'll get the grey filing box, so I run upstairs.

While there I remember the previous day she'd somehow found her way onto the conservatory roof and into this same room. Genius! I'll open the window and in she'll pop. Bad idea. Big Bad Idea. You may have read earlier, if you were paying attention, that it had been sub-zero temperatures. This didn't occur to me.

Alfie tends to follow me wherever I go, so true to form, when she saw me she made the leap (two feet) from solid flat rooftop to icy tilted glass. I felt 'the fear'. Never has a semi-naked man ran so fast through a house with a grey box (got the image?). Needless to say all was well in the end. Once Alfie was out of arms she just sauntered very cooly over to her food and chowed down. As she does.

Concordantly Concise

Reading other peoples blogs as I sometimes do (you lucky things) it occurs that I should try to just post on one subject a day but my mind wanders so much and new thoughts occur so often I have to end what I'm typing quickly so I can write on my new subject (so, so tempted to stop mid sentence there. Wouldn't that have been sooo funny?)

How do other cope with the staying on subject? Some people write thousands of words ON ONE SUBJECT. Jeez. Write a book why dontcha? Personally, if my musings were funny nee humorous, this is what I'd prefer - bang! you're in and bang! you're out. Insert your own reference to sex 'here'.

Oh the PAIN

A pledge.

I, [insert name here], do swear to go through hell, to push my lungs to their full capacity in the pursuit of bodily masochism. No longer shall these buttocks be flabby; no more shall my gut wobble when I walk. For today and from now infinitum, I shall exercise. For my heart is in the hands of my treadmill, my brain is in the pit of my pants and my lungs hurtsoveryfuckingmuchpleasemakethepainstopsoon.

Today, I weigh 204 pounds. Let the record show this to be approximately true.

The Adventures of 'Kate' - part 312

My sister-in law 'Kate' lives with her much elder boyfriend 'Ben' in Devonport, Plymouth. In a flat.

Now 'Kate' and 'Ben' earn far more than my wife and I ever did, even when the wife was working full-time. Despite this, they scrimp, scrounge and generally act like they're their own branch of Oxfam. They take pretty much anything we're giving away. Personally I'd prefer to sell it but my wife is STUPID!! and is perfectly happy to give it to them. For free. Nada.

Why do they act this way? Why does it seem like they have no self-respect? I have no idea and I have realised tonight that I don't actually care. You see, I now live in Leigham, many rungs higher on the social scale than Devonport. It's not quite Chaddlewood or even Mainstone but both are only a short walk away. Devonport however is on the other side of Plymouth. Bizarrely this has bought about a sudden excess of visits from 'Kate'. I'd always out down her lack of visits to the prescence of...me basically. I even offered to buy her pizza and go out for the evening if she visited my wife who was desperately lonely at that point and missed her greatly but no. She went to her mother, who told the wife who had a go at me for interfering and making 'Kate' feel bad! Women! (Any female readers might wish to know I love them all).

Incidentally, in a plot twist worthy of Douglas Adams, Jordan ('Ben's ADHD son) has now returned to his psycho mother in Wales and Olivia ('Ben's daughter by some other bint) is now refusing to stay the night and threatening to never visit. All of which is making him feel great. Oh, and Kate's a nagging biatch apparently.

The quest - an update

In my quest for new readers, I have convinced that fool Scaryduck to add me to his link-o-matic. I'm hoping this will increase my faithful readership up beyond the dizzy heights of five before Christmas. Perhaps SD will take pity and involved me in one of his tales of mirth - or woe - thus promoting me in the blogosphere.

I need to formulate a plan whereby I increase my internet prescence and yet spend time away from the computer. Now I have Direct Payments, I don't have a need to trawl the SFX forum (to avoid the tedium of my job - I can now read! or watch TV! all while getting paid! MWAHAHAA) and my domineering hold of conversation is falling by the wayside which leaves me wan-needing readers but not being arsed to spend the time talking to other people in the juvenile nee pathetic hope that they read this tripe. Hmm.

Thinking is needed. And a less demanding wife. Oh yes.

Nur nur nur nur

I'm so happy to have moved house. I got rid of all my disgusting throw-food-out-the-window neighbours and moved in to my new abode on the momentous day of 27th October 2006. In the style of the football reports at my Primary School 'everyone played well'. There was a slight bit of indecision on the part of the solicitors when at 1345 our sale had taken place but our purchase had yet to happen - "No, it now won't take place until after two". We were sat twiddling our thumbs in a cold, lonely and very empty apartment. Literally three minutes later "It's now gone through". Cue a mad dash to the estate agent f0r keys. It's lurvely.

I now have yet more additions to take me away from reading and slobbing. I have a garden and decorating and a conservatory and get to play "Just what does this plug in this socket do?". You see, much as I love my new house, the electrics seem to have beenput in by someone who just threw darts around a darkened room "Just there for the socket and all the way over there I'll put the light switch". I'm down to single figures now though for sockets and switches of which I know not the function. Not one of these operates the lights underneath the kitchen cupboard. Answers on a postcard. Please.

It took a whole seven days to unpack. Three months it takes some people! How??

In the garden last week we had a squirrel. The wife saw it as cute. I saw it as potential cat food. Speaking of which, Nana has found a new source of mice to torment.

A summary

So, many things have happened.

I've moved house. No problems experienced. Yay.

We have finally received Direct Payments so I now get paid to care for wife full-time at your expense. Yay.

Voltan is no more. Boo.

My cats have surveyed their new 'yard' and seem to be happy.

And...he's back in the room.

Much has happened in the past couple of weeks since my former promised return. It shall be covered in detail over the next few days. Having just spent three hours catching up on my blog and forum reading (the product of packing, moving, un-packing and being generally too busy to even take part in onanism) I'm a little 'screen tired' ie I can't be arsed*.



* Nothing to do with anal sex and/or concrete.