// Ultramagnetic Commuter ..//

2011-11-16T17:02:00.003Z

So, just over halfway through Arkham City on Xbox 360 and I’m becoming increasingly disappointed. As a huge fan of Arkham Asylum I’ve been looking forward to the sequel for ages. Arkham Asylum had it all, a thrilling atmospheric storyline, surprises, great boss battles and levels (Scarecrow was simply brilliant) but I’m searching for all of that in the new release.

On launching it looked very promising; the skylines look amazing and once I’ve completed the story mode I’m going to enjoy exploring but I’m over halfway through the game and there haven’t been any really notable points yet. I recall from Arkham Asylum that I became frustrated by not knowing where I’m supposed to be going and they haven’t really solved that one.

I’m currently on the Demon Trials which seem to make it unnecessarily difficult to fly and even when (or if) I master that, I can’t imagine that section is going to blow me away.

I’m starting to lose faith in the reviews of sites like IGN who are so stroked by the manufacturers and developers, their ratings just don’t look credible. Quite how this sequel can score higher than the original is just madness.

Right, I’m off to learn how to dive, bomb, dive, bomb…

Capitalism is Really None of Your Business

2011-11-03T14:33:00.001Z

Capitalism Is Kind, a photo by Herschell Hershey on Flickr.

As someone who works in London, I keep stumbling over people in tents. First of all it was when I popped down to Sports Direct at St Pauls. As I approached via the side streets I became conscious that the only vehicles parked were Police vans and the odd large Transit with a massive satellite dish on the top. I thought I was walking into a riot zone but it was ok, it was just some quite smelly people in tents.

As I rounded the corner I thought I’d slipped through a time and space portal to Glastonbury, but hang on, St Pauls was still there. What was going on? 30 seconds later I’m up to speed having read the banners and placards. These protesters to love a banner and a placard. Most of the time they don’t actually say anything, they just leave it to the signs they’ve made and sit in their tents.

Then, a week or so later I trip over some more tents in Finsbury Square. The world is become a great big festival.

I’m not breaking new ground here when I suggest these ‘protesters’ are a tad hypocritical. They sit in their expensive, commercially produced tents drinking their Starbucks coffees (yes, I’ve seen them) preaching to anyone who’ll listen but who also actually doesn’t care, that capitalism is evil. These people are using mobile technology to publicise their views on the likes of twitter; mobile technology which is brought to them by capitalism. You can’t have it both ways. If you’re going to camp outside Bloomberg and complain about the directors bonus (quite what the hell it has to do with anyone else is beyond me) then you need to be in pretty pure place yourself. So no mobile phone, no fancy tent, no products of errr… capitalism.

Because it you don’t put yourself in that pure place, you end up looking like people who just prefer living in tents and protesting about everything and anything to justify that lifestyle to the world. If you want to live in a tent then go for it; you just don’t need to put yourself in the middle of London and ask everyone to look at you.

2011-10-20T16:36:00.001+01:00

You've got to love those people on the forums at Money Saving Expert. In Martin Lewis's latest email he put a link to people's most embarrasing money saving techniques. They weren't so much embarrasing, as quite often pointless. I cringed as I read them - using teabags 4+ times, boiling a kettle once then pouring the rest in the flask for the rest of the day, forcing yourself to have a poo at work before you go home to save on toilet paper (honestly). Cringe with me http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=3531759

I did chip in to say that things like boiling smaller quantities of water in the kettle make fractional differences to electricity bills but gave up trying to convince people who buy a pack of ham, separate each slice and feeze them individually - it's the sort of argument you just ain't gonna win.

I was going to post some witty suggestions but they're a sensitive lot so I'll just make them available to you, my faithful reader.

Money Saving Tips

· Run around with the kids for 5 minutes before bedtime - It warms them up so no need to put the heating on!

· Hug the kettle when boiling water - Your body heat will speed up the boiling process

· Get double the use out of your underwear before washing it by turning it inside out on day 2

· If you get cold indoors, go and stand in the garden for 5 minutes - when you come back in you'll appreciate the warmth!

· On bin day, have a root round people's compostible bins - see what you can blend up to make a soup

· Never use the lights indoors - get head torches and only use those when you need to move

· Write letters, shower, go to the toilet, charge your phone, drink the tea, use the telephone all at work so you don't spend the money doing it at home

· On downhil stretches of motorway, turn off your engine until you get to about 20 mph - think of the petrol you'll save!

Truck Stop

2011-04-26T20:49:00.001+01:00

Truck Stop, a photo by /\ltus on Flickr.

Looming Sky

Bratalie Okri

2009-05-27T14:25:00.001+01:00

natalie-okri-britains-got-talent
Originally uploaded by mrpatok.

So Natalie Okri gets a hard time from Simon Cowell and we’re all feeling sorry for her?

Natalie “bursts into tears” when she’s beaten by the dance group Diversity.

Stop for a second and watch the tape again.

Natalie doesn’t burst into tears on hearing Diversity are going through to the final. Her first reaction is to perform the most stroppy little brat-face you could imagine. She wasn’t sad, she was brewing up for a tantrum.

She then realises she has to maintain that shruggy-shoulders cutesy girl act and tries to force some tears out. Unsuccessful, she covers her eyes with her arm (still no sign of genuine emotion) and then manages to squeeze out some tears.

Even as she leaves the stage she does so in the kind of way my 2 year old stomps off to bed when I turn the TV off.

Sure, she’s young and all that but why are we blinded by such people? If she was taller and uglier she wouldn’t have got through. If she didn’t keep doing that shruggy grin she wouldn’t have been popular.

Watch it back again and all you’ll see in an averagely talented girl who has been infected with a need for stardom at a ridiculously young age. Even down to the point that she almost burst into a full-blown diva tantrum. Modelling herself on people like Beyonce isn’t healthy for a little girl.

2008-12-15T17:09:00.001Z

Zone Alarm Screen Snip
Originally uploaded by iloveiggys.

I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth (whatever that means) but the latest update from Zone Alarm (version 8.0 I think) was rubbish. I've read they have actually told people NOT to download the latest version because of the bugs it causes. This is the same company who issued an update in the summer which broke everyones Internet connections.

In fact, the problem I experienced was it was blocking Windows Update and my XBox (AGAIN). Annoyingly this was very hard to verify until I eventually uninstalled Zone Alarm and hey presto Windows Update worked again. And of course, after spending hours configuring Zone Alarm to allow my XBox to connect to my PC, this new update completely screwed that up.

I reinstalled what Check Point said was a version 7.xx of the product but it somehow made itself the new version. But now it allows Windows Update which is helpful. I haven't tried the XBox. What are the chances?

I'm seriously reconsidering my use of this product. I've used it for years but they really need to make it simpler to do things like allow your XBox to your computer without the need to spend 4 hours Googling the issue to then spend another 2 hours following complex instructions written by some tech geek. I don't know, and shouldn't need to know what a subnest mask is. Life is too short.

I'm wondering whether the standard Windows Vista Firewall would be OK to revert to?

2008-10-09T15:29:00.001+01:00

CREDIT CRUNCH!
Originally uploaded by Laura Mary.

All this talk of the 'credit crunch' across the world is enough to depress you. I must admit, some of the sob stories I hear generate less sympathy than others.

You might think me harsh when I say this but I find it extremely difficult to have sympathy for all of the city traders who have been affected by this. These people earn ridiculous six figure salaries and I'm supposed to feel sorry for them because they won't be getting their £50,000 bonus this year? Sure, they have families to support like lower earners but they also have greater means to save in case of hard times.

I saw a report about a couple who worked for Lehman Brothers who said because they lost their jobs they might have to postpone their wedding. These people were earning a fortune, so my heart bleeds they won't be able to dress their crab with quite so much caviar now. I don't begrudge people high earning jobs but please, don't expect sympathy when the bubble bursts. These are finanical people, have they been living exactly to their means? Don't they save? Ironic?

And talking of saving, I saw another piece about a chap who had been saving for his retirement by buying shares in one instutution (forgive me, I forget which). Last year it was worth something like £175,000 and he's seen something like £50,000 wiped off the value. Again, I feel no real sympathy. To be saving that amount of money I'm thinking he's had a reasonable income but clearly lacks intelligence (or a financial advisor) to tell him not to put all of his eggs in one basket. Apparently, the value of shares can go down as well as up. What sort of person rests their entire retirement on the performance of one institution? A mad one.

2008-06-02T11:41:00.003+01:00

I'm not normally one to comment on news stories but one which ran over the weekend just made me. The new Mayor of London, the bumbling Boris Johnson, has banned drinking on the London Underground. This is a good thing. Grown ups, unless alcoholics, don't need to have a can of cider in their hand as they travel between pubs. It's just not necessary. In a civilised society, we don't need people making Tube carriages stink with their alcohol just because they are so desperate to carry on drinking. I'm not some old fart, I just think seeing fewer people drinking on the streets and public transport has to be good for rebuilding a more civilised society. Jesus, I sound like a politician.

So, as with any new law, this caused uproar amongst some sections of society. Namely those who feel passionately about drinking alcohol on public transport (hey, why not get passionate about something that matters?). These people decided to protest against the new anti-drinking law by having a Tube party to celebrate the end of drinking in public. (yes, these were grown men and women). The result? To quote The Times:

"There were 17 arrests after four Tube drivers, three other members of staff and two police officers were assaulted. Around 50 staff were said to have been verbally abused or spat at."

So, in order to make the point that drinking on the Tube shouldn't be banned, these 'party goers' decided to act in the very way which prompted the ban in the first place. If anything, their party demonstrated the very reasons to ban public drinking, not encourage it. It showed that people with minuscule minds and equally microscopic abilities to hold their drink will get rowdy abusive and violent given enough booze. Well done idiots, you proved a point although not the one you intended.

The people I saw interviewed on TV seemed remarkably like students so we can forgive their behaviour to a certain extent but not much. Get down the pub, it's your life age not mental age which determines whether you'll get served so you should be ok.

2008-05-29T13:58:00.001+01:00

girls out shopping
Originally uploaded by silvertony45.

A wet Bank Holiday weekend means only one thing. Shopping.

I'm not going to be a typical grumpy man and say I hate shopping and that it's only pleasurable for women. It has some plusses, namely I get a nice lunch. I think the real issue for me is the way women approach shopping. Call me sexist if you dare but before you do (ladies), please read on, and then, and only then, call me names if you can deny the allegations.

When I see something I like I look at one thing. The price. If it isn't more expensive than the total cost of everything I wore to go shopping then I might consider buying it. I might try it on but probably won't. I'll take it to the till and buy it.

Now a woman will do things rather differently. They will first caress the product with their fingers. In fact, woman commence the purchasing process as if blind, walking up and down the isles, rubbing, holding and lifting until the braille on one item screams "pick me up". Then next thing will be the size. An amateur may think they're looking for the price but that would be a schoolboy error. They never look at the price. Once a size too small for her is selected. It will be held up against her maybe a dozen times. Consideration will continue until I suggest she tries it on. This suggestion is met with the same sort of reaction as if I had suggested stuffing it up her jumper and running out of the shop. After 10 minutes of rubbing, lifting, and replacing, we're nowhere near the trying it on stage.

Time passes and whole shop is navigated twice, circling the prey that is the black top which is now slightly shiny due to the excessive rubbing. A change of direction and we're back in a flash because a curly haired twenty something started to sniff the same kill and there was worry that the target may be taken by a competitor. As Curly Hair goes to give it the first rub, it is whipped away like a tablecloth and held against her chest like a lost child now found. This expedites the matter and consideration, after 26 minutes, is now given to trying the bloody thing on.

Waiting at the changing rooms is an uncomfortable business when you're a bloke. Particularly a tall one. Changing rooms used to be a box with a curtain at the front. Now, they are often a box with a saloon style door at the front. When you're tall, this means that if you're anywhere near the changing rooms you cannot avoid seeing right in there. You're not looking, but, as Jerry Seinfeld said about looking at womens cleavages, your just get a sense of what's there. Spun into utter paranoia despite holding my young son and being with my other half, when you meet eyes with a 19 year old who is halfway through trying to pull up a pair of idiotically tight jeans revaling a thong the width of dental floss, you don't need to be Matt Parkman to hear her screaming in her head "you bloody pervert".

The Other Half doesn't understand this, so she calls for me to walk down and give my assessment of the item being auditioned for purchase. As I walk down the aisle all I can see out of the corner of my eyes are inappropriate portions of white flesh I shouldn't be seeing. As I get to the end I give my utterly pointless opinion on the top. I've seen those 'mind readers' on the TV who pick up on clues given by the overly willing idiots who belive in psychic abilities and have learnt a lot from them.

If she starts with "this looks alright, what do you think" then it's correct to say "that's nice".

If she starts with a more negative introduction to the showing such as "I'm not sure about this, what do you think" then be very careful. It's a classic trap whereby if you agree and say you don't like it and then she, after lots of twirling and bum rubbing, changes her mind, then she won't buy it because "you don't like it". And you won't hear the end of it either. There are only 2 instances when you say you don't like it. Firstly, if it reveals too much flesh. You have to draw the line here so be brave. You don't want blokes letching over her so tell her it makes her look fat. Secondly, if you're managed to catch a look at the price and it is going to end up costing you more than that week you've just booked at Center Parcs then tell her it makes her look fat. It's the only way.

Then, just when you think you're there. You've seen the price and it's affordable. You've seen it on her and she doesn't look like she's single, she says she'll have a look around and come back. It has taken 43 minutes in an over-lit under air-conditioned shop for her to decide it's only worth thinking about. Naturally, after what feels like 11 weeks cirumnavigating the shopping centre you end up back there and as night falls and owls are cooing in the suspended ceiling, and she goes to buy it.

The whole process is made so much worse because of the environment you are forced in. Modern women's fashion shops are now more akin to a teenage disco than a shop. Hideous fluffy pop music is blasted from giant speakers which smacks you in the face as you walk in. Then you have to squint as the lights are so bright it's as if you're going in for an operation. You spend the next drawn out 30 minutes of your life leaning on clothes rails and being asked to move by spotty teenagers wearing far less than they should or middle ages divorcees wearing far, far less than they should.

No more Bank Holidays until August thank god.

2008-05-14T15:49:00.001+01:00

Lunch Time!
Originally uploaded by crazy_gonka.

The joys of working in an office are sometimes so well hidden, you may feel that there were none.

In the days of open plan working, many people, including me until I reach Chief Executive status and I get myself a giant room all to myself, have to endure other people in close proximity. I don't know if it is particular people I struggle to endure but sometimes I just want to get under my desk and cry for a little bit.

When I eat my lunch at my desk I'm quite confident I manage to do so with minimal fuss. In fact, I'd go so far as to say, people wouldn't even know I was eating. So why do some of my closest colleagues eat like pigs returning from a hunger protest? Why must I see out of the corner of my eye a colleague's chin almost touching his desk owing to the fact he is trying to shovel as much tuna pasta salad into his gob as it possible in the shortest space of time? Why do my colleagues have to drink their bottled water as if they have just crossed the Sahara, sucking the bottle until it inverts, then breathing out as if they have just beaten David Blaine's holding-your-breath-under-water record.

Maybe I'm intolerant. Well yes, I am. I'm intolerant of people eating and drinking like animals.

I think next time I'll pick up their pasta box and drop it on the floor for them suggesting they get down and eat it like a dog. Although I think that might put my ambitions for Chief Executive back a couple of years.

(I managed to find a photo of some people eating at thier desks who look even more annoying than those I work with. Amazing)

2008-05-13T09:08:00.001+01:00

Banksy - pledge your allegiance to Tesco
Originally uploaded by artofthestate.

In the whirlwind life I live, I had the exciting joy of receiving new Tesco Clubcards last week. Overwhelmed with the sheer bliss this delivery brought me, I stopped to consider why I had received them.

Our existing Clubcards weren't broken, they looked in good condition and worked fine. So why, Tesco, have you sent us new cards? I have grumbled before about companies using 'green' issues solely for their own benefit and this is a prime example of them going completely against their commitment to the environment when it suits them. To send me my new Clubcards meant using plastic to make them, energy to create them, petrol to transport them, paper to print the letters and envelopes, and waste created by me throwing away my perfectly good existing card. I can see why credit card companies occasionally send out new cards for security reasons but there is absolutely no point sending out new loyalty cards. They simply want their latest branding in our wallets.

To make matter worse, they only sent me one new card rather than one for me and one for my other half. I emailed them to ask why they had only replaced mine and they said they couldn't just send one for her, she would have to go into a store, pick up a new card and ring them to get the new card attached to the existing account. I replied to say I had no intention of doing this when they had every piece of information they needed to simply just issue a new card. I asked them if I could just carry on using the old cards as there was nothing wrong with them. I think they've had enough of me because they haven't replied.

So today it's Tesco. Greedy, hypocritical Tesco. I went off them ages ago when they used that utterly annoying bloody woman Jane Horrocks in their advertisements. She puts on that silly bloody voice you know. Jamie Oliver might not be everyone's cup of tea but at least in Sainsbury's the staff don't have their ears peppered with gold and their mouths constantly churning chewing gum. And while I'm being utterly offensive, at least in Sainsbury's I don't stand out as being the only person in the building not wearing a tracksuit.

.

2008-04-16T10:21:00.001+01:00

banksy one nation under cctv whole piece
Originally uploaded by artofthestate.

So Banksy has created a new work of art on the streets of London for the masses to gawp at.

The whole Banksy phenomenon fascinates, interests and annoys me. I am something of a purist when it comes to street art and believe that street art isn't simply about art being put on the streets, but as much the way it was put there and the conditions under which it was created. This is where I have my first problem with Banksy. He's a valuable man these days (despite what he implies on his website when he says none of the gallery shows are anything to do with him. The ones in warehouses from London to LA are, and they must have netted him well over a million pounds over the last couple of years) and so he can't risk being caught.

So how does a street artist who everyone has heard of continue to keep up his profile by producing new work? He paints his work under cover and this is where I see Banksy has stepped away from being a street artist and into being simply a mainstream 'artist'. His latest "One Nation Under CCTV" piece was created using scaffolding which he had erected and covered in tarpaulin. This allowed him to work un-noticed and un-rushed through the night. No-one was going to call the police because it looked like some construction work going on. You may say 'what cheeky chap' for doing this and maybe that's fair enough, but it's hardly hardcore is it? I have heard on pretty good authority that Banksy, via his agent (again, how many hardcore street artists have agents?!) often ask permission to paint on walls. Lots was made in the papers about the wall he painted having a CCTV camera on it. I suspect the owners of the wall and land gave full permission for this piece or if they didn't, enquiries were made about whether the camera was in operation. Bansky may be cheeky but he's not stupid.

I don't dislike Banksy's work, I very much like it but just looking at some of the pictures of the hoards of people and journalists who have gone to photograph the piece, puts me off going. I've been following graffiti and Banksy work for years and now when I go to photograph a rat in Shoreditch, people don't look at me as if to ask why, they look at me because they want to be where I'm standing so they can take a photograph.

I'm always interested to see what Banksy will do next and, despite him cheating, I am impressed he is still doing street work at all, but I just don't want to share the admiration of his work with the whole country. I cannot abide the notion that his work is valuable and everywhere I go I see chiselled walls where rats once stood because opportunists have put them on eBay. I just want street art to stay in it's rightful place, on the streets for those who care to look for it rather than in the national newspapers for those who follow current affairs to be told about it.

Who cares about your haircut?

2008-03-27T12:09:00.002Z

5807360
Originally uploaded by lengwa55.

Please can we stop hearing about David Bloody Beckham and his 100th England cap? Why play him? He won't be in good enough shape to perform in the next major competition in 2 years so he should have been left out of the squad.

It was effectively a testemonial for a once great player who played as if it was a testimonial by doing very little. The FA must have leaned on Capello to play him so he can reach his amazing 'milestone' which can be listed when he is Knighted.

Good to see David James doing what he does best - throwing games through bad decisions...great on the line but as soon as Calamity runs out we all hide behind out hands.

Sneaky

2008-03-26T09:38:00.001Z

Alistair Darling
Originally uploaded by firthcycles.

I've been absent. Sorry.

I'm getting sick of hearing about 'green issues'. Whilst I appreciate we have to think about the environment, I am sick of governments and commercial companies exploiting it for their own gain. It's immensely convenient that hotels can write a heart-felt plea to guests to only put their towels out for washing if they really need to, "to protect the environment". And it's immensely convenient that companies are increasingly pleading with me to see if I'll agree to not receiving paper bills any more, "to protect the environment". Neither of these examples give any benefit to the consumer and the supplier stands to save money. So what a coincidence that environmental issues are so high profile.

And what is all the fuss about bloody plastic bags? Yes, I'm not stupid, I know they take a million years to degrade so lets just use paper bags. Why not? Probably because developing alternatives to the plastic bag cost companies money so they would prefer we all leave the supermarkets juggling oranges and balancing washing powder on our heads on the way back to the car, oh, I mean bus, because cars are evil and we shouldn't even look at them.

And while I on the subject of cars, what a sneaky, underhand stick Alistair Darling pulled at the Budget this year. The headline writers used phrases like 'gas guzzlers hit by tax rises' having been duped by the Thunderbirds man that he had only increased Road Fund Licences for environmentally viscous vehicles. Many people will have a nasty surprise when it comes to taxing their car after next April as, me included will be paying £100 a year more. So what do I drive then, a Hummer, an X5, a Porsche Cayenne? No, a family estate car with a modern 2L petrol engine. So it isn't 'gas guzzlers' (and besides, since when did we in Britain refer to petrol as 'gas'?), it's your average family car. You know, the sort that lots and lots of people own. Oh, that's convenient for the Government coffers.

It would have been more acceptable if these radical changed to the cost of taxing cars had been applied to new car purchases from April. That would make sense as people would know the tax band of the new car and it might make them think twice before buying a less environmentally friendly car. Quite how applying it to existing cars, with no warning is going to help the environment I simply don't know. All it will do will devalue my car but it's only 4 years old so I'm not going to scrap it to buy a Prius am I? Someone will drive it. It will stay on the road. Furthermore, if he really wanted to apply these new tax bands, tell us it is going to happen in 3 years time and give us a chance to change car but that still won't take larger cars off the road. All of this means that he will rake in millions, probably billions from these new tax bands with little impact on the environment but maximum impact on the tax payer.

So why not tax fuel? Makes sense on so many grounds. Once I have paid £270 to tax my car, I am going to want to drive it. If didn't pay any road tax but paid more for my fuel I would seriously consider every journey. If it worked out cheaper to get the train I would. But hang on, if we did that, it would probably result in people using their cars less - but hang on again, isn't that what the Government want? I think they would rather get our money up front and THEN tell us to stop driving our cars. There is no logic to raising taxes which aren't linked to car usage other than to make money.

Grrr.

Knock, Knock. Who's there? Banksy?

2008-01-17T13:45:00.001Z

In my continued love-hate relationship with Banksy, I'm curiously monitoring the site of his 'Old Skool' piece on Clerkenwell Road. It's had some sort of shack built round it which means either he is in there creating something new, or some entrepreneur is chiselling it off the wall.

It's frustratingly well concealed so you can't see what's going on. So many passers by stop to look, all leaving puzzled.

More discussion here...

2008-01-17T08:56:00.001Z

Banksy Mural Sells for $407,000 on Ebay
Originally uploaded by !Habit Forming.

Originally uploaded by James M Thorne.

Banksy is back in the news again.

I have many different, sometimes seemingly contradictory views about him.

Firstly, I like his work. I always have and probably always will.
Secondly, I also like lots of other streetart. I always have and probably always will.
My mum has heard of Banksy so probably thinks he invented street art. So do much of the media. He didn't. There are better and worse out there.
Banksy work sells for fortunes which he mocks, although has done nothing to prevent. In fact, he has fuelled demand by cleverly turning down Nike many years ago which made him hit the headlines, getting on Blurs album cover and getting associated with the Britart scene through his exhibitions (and selling out stateside). You could argue there is nothing wrong with an artist wanting to make a few pounds but remember, this is the artist who criticises capitalism and greed and at the same time creates numbered canvasses which sell for £50,000 each and puts a show on in the most shallow, greedy, white teeth, Escalade city of Los Angeles. Hardly keeping it real.
His most recent works seem to have been carried out by creating tents around the wall so as to work undetected. Again, hardly keeping it real.

Anyway, he has been back in the news because some entrepreneurial building owner put a wall up for sale which Banksy had decorated. We can't criticise Bansky for that, or, I believe, the building owner. He's used his brain and probably got himself £200,000 for the price of an eBay listing.

This contradicts with the owner of the market stall in Tottenham Court Road who sold part of his stall which had a Banksy piece on it. He grumbles and complains in the interviews that he was hard done-by as it was worth thousands and he only sold it for a few hundred, but I have little sympathy. If someone wants to buy something from you which you think is worthless, you need to think why that is. Dare I say that the person legitimately buying the stall is less greedy than it's owner, as the buyer made an offer and struck up a fair deal.

2007-12-20T15:19:00.001Z

Office Christmas Lunch
Originally uploaded by Ian Nelson.

I'm a bit late on my Christmas moaning post but better late than never.

When I thought walking home past hoards of office muppets off to their 'fun' Christmas meals, couldn't get any worse, the UK introduce a smoking ban. So now, not only do I have to avoid entire departments walking 10 abreast across the narrow London pavements, I now have to contend with football crowd size hoards of people standing outside pubs smoking and drinking like they are on some sponsored 'who can die youngest' competition. The pavements are blocked with these morons who would rather stand outside a nice warm pub shivering whilst sucking their fat reds cheeks in over a pack of 10 Bensons in record time. It's like running a nice warm bath and then lying on the bathmat next to it.

So what's the approach I should take? I can veer round them into the busy roads risking MY life because they want to stand there. Or I can wade through them. I've tried both. The road diversion is OK but you need to keep your wits about you. If I was to get run over, these office wallers would actually have a justification for being outside, as they could stand and gawp as the London Ambulance Service scrape me off the cobbles (no, we don't have cobbles in many London streets anymore, I'm just trying to make London sounds all quaint for my American reader(s)).

So option 2 is to struggle through the crowd. Now, I'm quite within my rights to do this and I'm sure them standing there is technically illegal. But what I don't want is to accidentally whack one of them, send his pint of overpriced angerjuice smashing to the floor and end up getting in a scrap with Nigel from Accounts. In fact I did clip someone the other night as I reverted back to the pavement to avoid a psychotic moped rider. It concerned me because he probably thought I was making a point by barging him and I wasn't, I just wanted to catch my train.

So what else does the festive season bring? Of course, the office outing.

Putting aside the rowdy lads and slaggy secretary piss-up at the local wine bar followed by Dave getting in a punch-up over being charged twice for the wine he's been guzzling all night, consider the more sedate office lunch. Strolling around London this week I have seen numerous groups of 10 or 15 people all toddling off for lunch preparing to talk to each other for the first time that year.

When I see a group like this there's always been something which makes them stand out as incompatible with each other. It's not something as simple as their age as people of all age groups can blend. At last I have worked it out. It's their coats. You'll have the young guys in their North Face puffers bowling along leading the 'fun', but he'll be leading Simon and the rest of the Admin Department and Simon, sporting a Berghaus jacket is a whole different type of person to Mr North Face. They might both be wearing practical coats but Mr North Face is fashion and Mr Berghaus walks up mountains at weekends with a flask and sandwiches. Mr North Face probably paints graffiti on trains and Mr Berghaus gets the train to the Costwolds.

Then you have the ladies. Forgetting all other attire, the girls wearing the short cropped jackets which are making them shiver with coldness compare with the long black sedentary coat of the middle aged perfumed secretaries. This contrasting with the crazy young office assistant who left her coat in Trevors car the night before so she is vibrating with coldness with her arms folded tightly across her thin, loosely buttoned blouse. At least the sleazy guys from Facilities will warm her up once they get in the restaurant and they all try to get as close as possible to get the perfect cleavage view position.

The only saving grace is that I have one more day of battling the streets of London and then a nice break.

If I don't come back before 2008 then have a good break.

ps That is not me in the photo or anything to do with my office

2007-11-20T08:42:00.000Z

Saw this a while ago and just loved it. Even if you aren't a fan of beatboxing or Pop Idol (who is?) it's still well worth a watch (ignore the fact it's in French too).

Office Workers in Need

2007-11-15T10:14:00.001Z

DSC00623
Originally uploaded by JamesThorpe.

When I was a kid I used to rather like Children in Need. As I have grown up, as with many things, I've become utterly disinterested.

Of course it is for a good cause. I do donate some money because it goes to worthy causes but I can't suffer the 64 hour long TV show.

Don't think I'm going to dress up like a twat of a clown at work shaking a bucket full of coppers in order to raise funds. And please. Don't expect me to find it hilarious when I see the Swindon branch of NatWest dressed up like characters from the Wizard of Oz rattling tins for the Worthy Cause.

Just this morning there was some group of bank workers dressed up in a variety of costumes standing in their company car park grinning through frozen cheeks. Frozen because the office dollies had decided to use it as an opportunity to dress up like some kind of saucy stripograms under the guise of some Disney theme. No doubt they'll pop up later with an outsized cheque for £65.43.

Sponsored this and that and sitting in a bath of baked beans is surely an out of date concept - or maybe it's just another sign I'm becoming a grumpy old man.

I hope they raise a lot of money but if they are going have the BBC newsreaders performing some hilarious stage act (again...) please don't expect me to tune in.

You can donate to BBC Children in Need here

2007-11-02T11:32:00.000Z

How much credit to these spammers give me?

Got this today -

Dear NatWest OnLine Banking user!

Our Maintenance Subdivision is performing a scheduled Digital Banking Service update
By visiting the link below you will commence the procedure of the user login confirmation:
http://www.[LINK REMOVED]
These instructions are to be emailed and followed by all clients of the NatWest Digital Banking
NatWest does apologize for any troubles caused, and is very grateful for your cooperation.
If you are not user of National Westminster Bank OnLine Banking please ignore this e-mail!
--- This is an automated email, please do not reply ---

© 2007 Natwest Bank Internet Banking. All Rights Reserved.

First of all, I doubt one of Britains larges banks would open an email to a customer without addressing it to a named person and using an exclamation mark at the end.
Secondly, if I did bank with NatWest, I would know that it isn't called 'Digital Banking'.
Thirdly, I wouldn't expect a British bank to use an American spelling (i.e. apologize).
Fouthly, if they had convinced me, because I am a retarded, short-sighted dimwit, then they say if I am not a NatWest customer then I should ignore the email. Hang, on, you addressed it to me the "NatWest OnLine Banking user!" and now you're not sure if I am a customer!

Some idiot will still click it...

2007-10-19T11:13:00.001+01:00

Originally uploaded by thistleamy5.

Is the quality of journalism in this country plummeting or am I just becoming sick of it?

I don't buy a tabloid but can't help but see headlines from the hundreds of people who do and sit on my train every day. Why must we sensationalise the news? News is boring, so let's not try to spice it up with misleading catchy headlines focussing on more interesting rather than relevant parts.

Just today I saw a headline about the man who killed a vicar recently. An awful tragedy. Today's story about this was about a man, photographed bare chested, demonstrating a scar on his back which had been caused by the vicar killer. The headline was something along the lines of "Killer did this to me before going on to slay vicar". Slay? Slay? Who uses the word slay? It may have been a word regularly used in medieval times but to use it in a modern newspaper (yep, The Sun) is pure and simple sensationalism.

But that is what the papers thrive on. Sensationalism. Since when were the Police in the UK called 'Cops'? The tabloids never refer to them as the Police purely because calling them Cops makes them sound more dramatic and film-like. Starsky and Hutch were Cops. Juliet Bravo was a Policewoman. Which is more exciting?

Why do we have to endure Madeleine Mccann stories day in, day out, each day revealing some new evidence which by the next day we've all forgotten about because it was probably made up by some hack trying to fill his pages? Just yesterday I saw a story based on a friend or relation of Kate McCann saying that Kate had said if she had bigger breasts then the nation would have more sympathy for her. If she really did say this then it still doesn't justify half a page. If Kate is interested, I think she would have got more sympathy if she had showed an ounce of emotion throughout the whole ordeal rather than looking so stony faced and guilty.

If there is no news they should just print papers with fewer pages or if they must, fill the pages with quirky animal stories but please don't just make stuff up.

The wider issue of all this is that The Sun gets more readers than any other paper and they shape a nations view. Ask a typical Sun reader if they think we should be in Europe and they will say no. Ask them why and see if they actually have an opinion. If the England football manager should be sacked then it is The Sun who will tell us first.

I would like to conduct an experiment where over the course of 1 year, every story in say 3 tabloids is noted and followed up. Many of the stories printed are predicting things happening, so-and-so marrying whoever, some overpaid Premiership player moving teams etc. all of which could be followed up a month later to see if they were true. I expect the football transfer stories will probably have something like a 10% truth element and the rest maybe 20.

2007-10-11T09:59:00.001+01:00

EAT! EAT! EAT!
Originally uploaded by Duck and Drive!.

So it's that time of year again when the trains are either so hot you need a shower by the time you get to work because you've sweated half your body mass on the way to work, or they are so cold it's like travelling to work in a refrigerated van.

Today though it was just right. Just right. Then some red-cheeked overweight office dolly comes waddling onto the train looking for a space to squeeze in her gravity defying buttocks. Eventually she finds a space which is approximately 30% too narrow for her cellulite to squeeze into but she has a go anyway. I then have to endure 15 seconds of this chubby lady struggling to defy science like someone trying to fit a bucket load of Play-doh into a thimble.

Then, once the impossible hasn't been achieved and I have half a stone of lard resting on my knee, she realises that the effort of walking and squeezing has made her hot so she hoists herself out of her seat/me and tries to open the window. I'm not sure what it is about train windows which people find so difficult to fathom, but she, like many others, then spends 10 seconds pulling and tugging on the window. With her body weight I was concerned at one point that she would pull the entire window out of the frame but eventually she realises that you just pull the lever down and then pull the window down. It's easy if you have a brain.

So back she comes, thighs draped across me and the other poor soul in our row of three. I think there are some men who like that sort of contact but not me.

Now as if this whole performance of sweat and flab wasn't enough, I then realise that whilst *she* might be hot, the majority of passengers are not. This is probably because we aren't so well insulated as her but we still must endure the chilly October winds howling through the train because she has the insulation of an arctic seal.

So what's the etiquette here? She didn't ask if anyone minded her opening it so am I in my rights to just shut it? I don't want to row with someone at 7o'clock in the morning, particularly someone who could probably crush me to death, but at the same time I would rather not be freezing cold.

So like a true man I wait for her to nod off and then gradually extract my leg from her flabby grip and quitely shut the window. Of course this means there is much less seat to go back to but at least I start to get the feeling back in my feet after a few minutes.

Another great start to another great day.

2007-10-10T15:37:00.000+01:00

Just how ugly are nose piercings on women? I can see how women, like men (well some), might like to improve their appearance. Maybe have their hair done, buy some snazzy shoes or a posh frock. Women wear make up to hide the blemishes, spots and scars which is very dishonest if you wake up next to something which looks like it roams freely in Jurassic Park, but I can understand why they do it.

I cannot understand the desire to pierce their nose and put a metal stud through it. The majority of these aren't small and you spend the whole time double taking them because it looks like they've got a huge blob of snot hanging inside their nose.

Do these girls think it makes them look beautiful? How could they think such a thing? I guess it goes back to our tribal ancestors who put bones and other things through their nose, presumably to show their status in society. What status does this give the pierced girls of today? Miss Stupid?

On other news, another excellent Baker and Kelly Podcast this week (well, last Friday). No idea what their longer term plans are but I hope they carry on with it for free, even if it means sticking a few adverts in it. When will they revisit the 'Any More Pie?' series? Great stuff chaps.

2007-10-08T17:19:00.001+01:00

hacker
Originally uploaded by Luiso.

I consider myself to be pretty internet savvy (whilst never venturing in geek territory, of course). I can spot a spam email a mile off and smell a dodgy website or bent eBay seller before they've had a chance to tell me to "l@@k!!".

Why then, I ask myself was I recently turned over by an internet scam? Maybe I'm exaggerating with such terminology but when I logged into my internet accounts a couple of weeks back a few thousand pounds had disappeared. I didn't get it. I checked, and sure enough in one transaction, £3,000 had been withdrawn. I was worried.

I contacted my online bank who told me the name of the account which recieved the funds. "Do you know this person?" they asked. "No, never heard of them". "Well they have your login name, mothers maiden name, your password, date of birth... Now I was really scared - what if the bank wouldn't refund the money? How had this happened? Just how dodgy *was* that site I 'accidentally stumbled' on last Wednesday?

Within 2 days the money was back. The bank told me they were pursuing it and as I didn't authorise the payment they credited me back straight away. Relief but no resolution.

I scanned my home computer (which is already equipped with anti-virus and a decent firewall). I was clean (if you exclude some dubiously named cookies from sites I can't imagine what sort of person may stumble upon...).

Next port of call was the work computer. Now this is where I become frustrated. Like many organisations, you aren't allowed to do software updates, patches etc. on your work machine. You are at *their* mercy when it comes to your security. Luckily, my role means I am able to do a bit more on my computer then most so I ran Spybot and the answers were revelaed. Not only was my computer infected with spyware, adware and every time of 'ware, it also revealed a keylogger and an 'infostealer' on my system. Those last 2 just exist in sensationalist newspaper aticles don't they? No. They are real and I got caught.

Although I found the threats and removed them I still don't know how they got there. I rarely venture from my list of regular sites at work so quite how that lot got on my system I just don't know. Had my browser been patched, I doubt they would have been activated but we're under strict instructions not to run any updates. Quite why, when such things can happen to users I don't know but that's IT policies for you.

So now I won't use my work PC for anything bank related which is annoying as like most office workers, it's from the office where you run your life. Not quite sure how I'll fill my days now.

2007-10-05T12:42:00.001+01:00

Paris Tunnell
Originally uploaded by frabber.

Could someone tell me the point of the current Diana inquest? What a waste of everyone's time.

Why Mohammed Alfayed cannot let this go escapes me. Yes, he lost his son in a tragic accident but he really needs to deal with it without continually looking to blame someone other than the bad driver who was cheuffeuring his son. It was an accident. If there had been some "plot" to kill Diana, I can't imagine they would have orchestrated it in front of a pack of Paparazzi.

There has been an inquest which Fayed did not like the sensible conclusion from so he ordered another one. We are seeing footage of Diana and Dodi which we have seen on numerous other occasions, the point of which I do not know. What does whether they were getting engaged or Diana being pregnant have to do with the circumstances of the crash?

The judge correctly said Diana's family should be considered in all of this but 10 years on the case keeps being dragged up. I don't get the impression her sons are still "looking for answers". They probably want to get on with their lives without constant reminders of the tragic death of their mother.

So, Fayed, you have your inquest. And I will tell you right now that the outcome will be a verdict of accidental death. Then what, another inquest?

2007-09-27T16:02:00.001+01:00

Blackberry addicts
Originally uploaded by Meg Pickard.

I know I have banged on before about Blackberrys and email but I'm going to do it again.

The idea of email is that it is a passive means of communication. For example, you wouldn't email someone to tell them their hair was on fire. It's "read it when you're ready".

I remember my first graduate job for a very large company, around 10 years ago, where email existed but was barely used. If you were going to email something you would have to tell the person you were doing it to make sure they logged in. You also had to have a 10 minute conversation with the recipient reading out their email address as if they were speaking to a martian, spending 5 minutes explaining the @ sign, repeatedly saying "not the word 'at'", "it's the funny looking 'a' on your keyboard near the 'L'".

So email was born and people started using it to send documents, spreadsheets and memos and it worked very well. It saved paper flying around and was quicker and less annoying than faxing. It was progress.

But then it started to develop with people using it for other things, like arranging meetings. If you have a meeting which you want 5 people to attend, assuming they are generally desk-based people, trying to arrange it my email is retarded. I guarantee that by using that old gadget called the telephone, you can have that meeting set up and the room booked in under 30 minutes. Relying on email always means you will get instant replies from 2 people, a next day reply from 1 person, and hear nothing from the rest. And to compound your stupidity, rather than switch mediums and follow up with those 2 people by phone, you email them again. And of course, hear nothing. This can go on for days or even weeks until you eventually track them down (when you bump into them at the coffee machine and they nonchalantly say "oh, I owe you an email don't I?") and then person 1 and 2 are now booked up and you have to start again.

This now means were are using email in a way which is a backward step. If the telephone had been invented after email, it would have created a sensation. A device which allows you to speak to someone in the next room, country or continent is amazing. To write to them and click 'send' is less amazing.

It seems to be very much the norm that when you get to a certain level in a corporate organisation that you are given a Blackberry. A wedding ring, complete with ball and chain, marrying you to the company. I was on the train this week next to a couple of corporate slaves. Husband and wife, they both had Blackberrys and were paying each other less attention than their handheld devices. It was quite sad. They worked for the same company and it was cringe worthy that they were almost power-struggling against each other, thumbing through new emails at the same time as criticising other managers and departments. At one point, the bloke actually started complaining about the speed of his connection. I imagine a night out with these 2 would be scintillating. I think what made this couple from hell worse was that she was wearing a trouser suit. And chewing gum.

It is very common to see office workers get on the train, sit down and immediately check their emails on their Blackberrys. How important are these emails? Is it their companies insisting they check their emails or are they just work-obsessed slaves?

2007-09-24T15:06:00.001+01:00

Observed some interesting human behaviour today.

Whilst finding somewhere to sit and eat my overpriced lunchtime sandwich I saw a long row of concrete blocks running alongside an office building. Once I made my way there, battling past the office workers of London organising their lives over their lunchtimes on their mobile phones, I noticed a series of signs. Each of these painted blocks was attached to the office building and built at a perfect height to be sat on. But at each one was a sign which read "Private Property. Do not sit here".

There must have been 30 of these signs. The blocks were on a public footpath but presumably they were attached to private property but to go to the trouble of signposting every one was ridiculous. And quite what harm a backside would do a concrete block I don't know (and I include some of the largest arses ever to squeeze into a Miss Selfridge trouser suit which I observed today).

The rule was so ridiculous in fact that someone was sitting on one. He looked very student-esque, reading his book and sipping his coffee under a bobble hat. So I thought "sod it", live life on the edge. So I did. Snipers never emerged from the trees and I wasn't cuffed and thrown into the back of a Police van. So I sat there and scoffed my Pret.

In fact, within a few minutes a couple of other office workers did the same.

The sheep effect has been widely documented (i.e. because Student Boy and I had sat there, others would follow) but what I loved watching was people's reactions to our rebellion.

Some people (men) made exaggerated looks to the "Do not site here" order and then looked at the student. Many just looked at the student and their disgust was clear. One idiot even rolled his eyes. At no point did anyone look at me (even though I was on the next block). People looked down at the scruffy student for breaking the rules but showed no such hatred for their fellow office dwellers.

So I guess it all comes down to snobbery. People will judge and look down on people they feel superior to but will leave 'their own' alone.

I would love to return to the row of blocks at night replacing the signs with "Please sit here", "Designated picnic area", "We welcome bottoms", "Don't be shy, spend some time here". "Urban campsite", "Bum park"...shall I stop now?

2007-09-18T15:38:00.001+01:00

So what is Danny Baker up to? He had laid the foundations for his paid-for podcast and one week in he decides to team up with his old mate Danny Kelly and put the All Day Breakfast Show on hold.

I understand there are a number of disgruntled fans who have paid up for some sort of annual subscription via Wippit who are now wondering if it was a waste of money. Glad I didn't pay.

I had intended to pay and subscribe but when you convert the £2 a week into over £100 a year I started to think it was probably not good value. Yes, people need paying (of course, I'm being paid to blog. Well, technically that isn't true, but I am being paid *whilst* I blog) but that is what advertising is for. I have no idea how lucrative such advertising is compared with paid-for subscription but it must be the way to go.

Of course I am very pleased that Baker and Kelly have been reunited. The partnership was probably Baker at his best and I still remember some parts of the shows like they were yesterday. But how long will they last before they want me to pay? The Times podcast (which Kelly has now departed from) have a sponsorship deal with some manly skincare product so why can't B&K?

I never paid for the Ricky Gervais podcasts when he decided to start charging. I think the difference there is that Gervais had run his course. It became repetitive and contrived before it went to paying subscribers so I didn't miss it when they started to cash in. I would miss Baker and Kelly if they want me to pay but with so many others putting stuff out for free, I don't see why they can't. If the podcast model with advertising doesn't pay and that's why you're in it, then maybe you shouldn't be. I've heard more than once that (Gervais excluded) you won't make your fortune in podcasting.

I wonder why Baker can't just stick to his day job on the BBC and do some podcasting on the side. I think he may struggle to make a living out of it and with the disappointing relaunch of the ADBS this month I don't think he's done himself any favours encouraging people to part with their hard earned.

Bloody Shoreditch

2007-09-06T15:42:00.001+01:00

Shoreditch, 101ers
Originally uploaded by ro_jo_sul.

Everyone wants to be a street artist in Shoreditch. There are some fine artists around but that place makes me feel a bit sick now.

Every little advertising junior must have a back pocket full of wacky stickers to slap around East London hoping to be the next Banksy or DFace. Strolling round there recently I still saw some creative stuff but the streets are still full of people who just don't get (or mind) the fact they still look like Nathan Barley. Unless you're wearing the latest preposterously outsized sunglasses and wearing your jeans so low that commuters are trying to park their Brompton fold-away bikes in your backside, people stare at you as if you are naked.

If you dare walk through in a conventional suit then you may as well go dressed as a clown (although thinking about it that would probably be considered uber-cool and by next week they'd all be doing it).

I think what epitomises the unoriginal state of street art in Shoreditch is, and I will say his name once and once only, Cartrain. I'll snap shots of decent and interesting peaces but never his. Just yesterday I saw a couple of cardboard framed pictures stuck to the walls. Streetart by it's very nature is often nicked but these were still pristine. They were some terribly unoriginal picture of Tony Blair doing something or other and some unfunny attempt to satirise him had been made by this pre-pubescent Banksy clone. Remember, this is the person who put something or other in one of the London museums and managed to get on London Tonight for doing it. Quite how this can be deemed newsworthy when Banksy did the exact same thing not too long ago is beyond me. Banksy has on his website "I want to be a non-conformist. Just like everyone else". He should remember that.

That isn't to say all of the streetart is bad, some is excellent (see pic). I think the problem is the sheer saturation and it's propulsion of areas like Shoreditch to ridiculously cool status. Banksy sold his soul for the pound (and dollar) and there are loads who want to follow.

I went down to Eine's exhibition in Shoreditch but didn't go in. I was expecting some relaxed exhibition I could mingle about in but what I saw from outside was a small room with a woman by a computer presumably there to take orders for the prints. At a glance it looked like any other shop rather than an art exhibition. Does everyone want to be a star or does everyone want to be rich?

Eine seems to have stepped up his game with a massive piece opposite Cargo which I hope was illegal as although some buffing takes place, the authorities must have it in their mind that the more trendy stencils and streetart which decorate those streets, the better it is for baggy trousered house-buyers earning sky high salaries designing logos for cash-plump corporations.

Of course I'll still have a wander around because there are gems to be found but please keep me away from those people.

2007-08-13T14:59:00.001+01:00

Hug Tree
Originally uploaded by sivatonight.

What is it with women who breastfeed? Not all of them of course, but some of them. The ones who are making a point. The exhibitionists.

I was at a friend of friend's house recently and strolled into the living room where someone I hardly knew looked at me as if I had exposed my genitals to her grandmother whilst shouting "who's the Daddy now?". She promptly frowned and shuffled in her seat pulling a shawl over her top half. I could then see that she was breastfeeding. She wasn't alone in the room as some of her family were there but it was me that was made to feel terribly uncomfortable. How can that be right? I wasn't the one exposing myself in the middle of a living room right next to the buffet table. It's not as if I'd crept into an area that was remotely private. I'd just walked into the main living room to get a sausage roll.

Now hold up. I can already hear you shouting "but it's natural". Indeed it is, but then so is defecating but I think I would have been asked to leave if I had done that on a plate next to the cous cous.

And furthermore, if you must do it to make you point, don't give me the scowl from hell when I look at you. If you're in public and you get your breast out, I'm afraid to break this to you, but blokes are going to look at you. If you don't mind this then great, we can all get along, but if you do mind then maybe don't do it on the bus.

I'm not suggesting that breastfeeding should be confined to locked cupboards but just think about what you're doing. It is a natural thing to do but in a society where the majority of people walk around clothed demonstrating that we have moved on past neanderthal man, I think you need to take that into account. Picking your nose, urinating, breaking wind, coughing are all "natural" but we deal with them in different ways taking into account society in the 21st century.

I walked past a coffee shop a few months ago and there was a woman breastfeeding right in the window. Almost as if she chose the most prominent seat to get the best audience. And we aren't allowed to frown at her are we? Oh no, the overweight (aren't they always?) crusader was patrolling her environment with Action Man eyes to make sure no-one was giving her disapproving looks, ready to battle with anyone who dares to deprive young Olivia of her milky goodness.

So we can chalk exhibitionist breastfeeders off my Christmas list as well now.

2007-08-08T12:00:00.001+01:00

Cheap Day Return to Huddersfield (24 Feb 2007)
Originally uploaded by alephnaught.

Not quite sure why, but whenever my train arrives at the mainline station in the morning, 2 other trains arrive at the same time on the platforms either side. So not only do I have to contend with The Speedy Weavers who dart in and out of the commuters in order to get to the barrier 2.3 seconds earlier than everyone else, The Waddlers who really should shed a few pounds and as a consequence of their rotund shape, plod along duck-like to the barriers and The Paper Pikeys who won't buy a paper so prefer to scavenge around the emptying train looking for complete papers without the Soduko filled in, but I now have to contend with another 1500 odd people heading for the same set of barriers at the same time as me.

I have a feeling that the station staff wait for 3 trains to be ready to arrive and then send them in at the same time. Just for a laugh.

As a consequence of this crowd overload which makes everyone walk in pigeon steps waddling from left to right like a thousand ducks, when I get to the barriers often the quickest way through is to flash my ticket at the inspector. It's the same inspector every day. He has perfected the 'I'm in charge frown' but when it actually comes to looking at the ticket which I have taken the trouble to remove from my bag, he isn't so thorough. In fact, I feel a bit silly when I hold up my season ticket and realise he is actually looking at the busty brunette trying to squeeze her ample posterior through the automatic barriers or he is looking at the clock wondering how much longer he has to stand there for.

So this week I have shown him less and less of my ticket to see how far I can go before he stops me to ask for a better look. Monday, I held it upside down. Yesterday, I only showed the ticket and not the photocard (quite how we think in 0.3 of a second he can check the date of the ticket and match the photocard number with the ticket is beyond me). Today I held my ticket wallet fully open but facing the opposite direction so he could only see the back. Tomorrow I am going to hold a completely closed wallet and the next day I'm not going to get it out at all. If the experiment continues in the same way I might not bother with a ticket next year at all.

2007-08-02T16:03:00.001+01:00

A nice little runaround?

2007-08-02T09:07:00.001+01:00

Southend Seagulls
Originally uploaded by Andy Gosling.

I stumbled across a Flickr photostream for someone who takes a vast quantity of photographs from the Southend-on-Sea area. The majority of the photos are banal but a few are interesting.

I was annoyed at the way this person put down the area of Southend-on-Sea by commenting on photos she had taken of the area. In fact, this person thinks it is hilarious to mock most of Southend and surrounding areas but declines to insult the backward village of Great Wakering where she lives. No-one has told her that calling everywhere in Essex 'Chav' isn't funny anymore. It's like laughing at people who drive Skodas or calling people 'baldie'.

In the past, Southend seafront has been a pretty dire place but over recent years it has had some money injected and the area, particularly round the pier, and has been greatly regenerated. However, this particular local resident described the refurbishment of the area as a monstrosity. Fair enough, each to their own opinion.

But what annoyed me was she put the photo in Flickr groups, "Shit Britain" and "Essex sucks". I don't know why that bugged me so much but it did. This is not an example of "shit Britain". If you think it is so "shit" then why don't you move somewhere far away?

Ironically, this person lives in Great Wakering which is well known in Essex as being where the odd and ends of society live. You know, the sort of place where grown-ups point at cars.

My comment on her photostream was not offensive. I just asked why she had labelled Southend as "shitty" and said I thought this was unfair. Her mature response? To delete the comment and block me from further comments or contact. So rather than respond to my comment, maybe defending her views, she just deleted the comment and blocked me.

Well Julieanne Savage, you are famous. Someone has blogged about you. Even if they are insulting you for your narrow-minded immature opinions of the county in which YOU chose to live.

Wanna Dance Baby?

2007-07-30T17:02:00.001+01:00

P1020721
Originally uploaded by skrishnan37.

Sometimes when you're browsing Flickr you come across a photo which makes you smile.

For every immensely talented amateur photographer on Flickr, there is a person sharing their awful family photos with the world.

Now I don't want to be nasty but these women aren't looking their best here. The woman in the middle in particular looks petrified. Possibly at the thought of the woman on our left falling on her.

Sorry. I'm sure they'd be very offended it they read this. They should be thankful I've held back.

Oops.

2007-07-27T17:06:00.001+01:00

Poster of missing Madeleine McCann, The Strip, Albufeira
Originally uploaded by lloydi.

I see there have been a spate of slurs against the McCann family about the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of young Madeleine. I wrote a post on this before but didn't publish it as it's such an emotional subject considering poor Madeleine still remains unaccounted for.

Firstly I have to say that it is an awful shame that Madeleine is missing. I feel for her, and her family. Also, I won't ever refer to her being abducted seeing as noone has the first clue where she is or how she got there.

The website of the McCann's local paper closed it's message boards as people were posting comments against the McCanns. I can't see why they banned people commenting - what's the point of only allowing people to post one opinion? Maybe some people blame the McCanns - right or wrong, we don't all have to agree.

I find the way Madeleine's parents reacted to the whole thing extremely odd. Whilst showing some emotion, they were very calculated about the whole thing. Almost immediately switching their attention to almost marketing Madeleine's disappearance with posters, balloons, banners and now, even those yellow wristbands. Quite what yellow wristbands will do to remedy the situation I do not know. Looking at their FindMadeleine website it looks like they are selling something - shiny website full of glossy photos complete with cheesy annoying soundtrack. Again, what do the McCann family stand to gain by posting a family photograph of themselves on their website? Will it help the hunt? No. It simply gives the impression they adore the publicity and are trying to prove they are such a happy family. The blog, the balloon release, it's all a bit too much like they are raising money for their local hospital rather than mourning the loss of their first born.

Why did the McCann's have to visit the Pope? Devout Catholics I hear you cry! In that case I'd have a few strong words and questions for the bloke in white about the work of the good Lord considering their current predicament. Why did Gerry really NEED to go to America?

The fact of the matter is the McCanns DID leave their daughter unattended and that is what led to her disappearance. They say they were checking on her every half an hour as if that will convince us that was sufficient. It clearly wasn't as Madeleine disappeared. They are partly to blame and as Madeleine mother said in an early interview, they have to live with that which must be awful. I think they should be slightly more humble about it though as for every time they say they didn't do anything wrong they lose support from a few more people.

I think we can learn from this. Maybe on holiday we do relax that bit more and maybe Madeleine's disappearance will serve as a message to us all to think twice about taking our eyes off our little ones. I know I will.

I wish she is found safe and well.

2007-07-19T15:58:00.001+01:00

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - 3 days to go - and it's leaked!
Originally uploaded by finkangel.

I've never got the whole Harry Potter craze. I can slightly see the attraction for children but the amount of adults who lap it up is simply demented. And queuing up outside a BOOK shop at midnight is deranged. Although it is surely indicative of todays 'must-have' society where people are prepared to sacrifice a nights sleep to buy a BOOK. What will they do, go straight home and speed read it through? It's a BOOK!

Now, the greedy old JK Rowling is making a fuss that a couple of bookstores are going to release the book early. It's pretty pathetic that she will go to such lengths (as a millionaire already) considering this is the last Harry Potter book. What does she stand to gain? And why can't we call her by her name instead of her initials?

I found the comment by one of the offending embargo breaking sellers, DeepDiscount.com hilarious, as they suggested to customers who had received it early "by mistake" to "put it to one side". Ridiculous.

Irish Jig

2007-07-19T15:33:00.001+01:00

Irish Jig (Dixon 2005)
Originally uploaded by dead redhead.

I have found myself far less magnetic lately although on Monday some 20 year old in a bad suit with a wide-boy attitude decided that I would be the one moving as we passed each other at the station. Unfortunately for him, my arm was locked solid so it was him and his cheap pin-stripe that went into a spin.

A few weeks back, someone was doing that 'I'm going to walk through the station with an attitude'. If you're in a bad mood, don't take it out on every commuter. As he got to me he deliberately barged me out of the way. But as much of a big man he thought he was, he made sure he was walking so fast that no-one could have taken any issue with him. He'll get it one day.

One thing I have been suffering with lately is the indecisive wanderers. These are the people, often wearing rucksacks over both shoulders, who drift across the pavement. So you go to pass them and they drift in your way, so you go to take the other route and they drift back. I look at right tit doing some Irish jig behind these people as they decide which direction they are going drift for the next 3 seconds.

2007-07-13T16:07:00.000+01:00

I read that Sat Nav thefts are at an all time high. Well if you leave it on your dashboard it's going to get nicked.

The article linked above suggests options to make them less easy to steal such as removable keys etc. Surely, seeing as these devices have GPS senders and recievers built into them by their very design, all that would be needed is for each unit to have a unique code which, if stolen, the sat' nav' company can just look where the unit is? Or am I missing something here? Isn't it like the old joke about the person who boasts about having a golf ball which is impossible to lose, and when asked where he got it he says he found it?

There's been a real lack of posting lately but I'm back on track now. Like you care.

2007-05-21T10:55:00.000+01:00

This weeks episode of Wife Swap was billed as being packed with controversy but it wasn't really. Some frumpy woman decides some days after someone pinches her backside that it equated to sexual assault and then realises she is a deluded idiot and drops the charges. The programme built up to a massive anti-climax.

What was interesting was the attitude the so-called 'green' family had to the environment. They spoke as if they were leading the green revolution, leaving the City to start a new eco-friendly life in Wiltshire. So what sort of house would we expect to see them in? An eco-friendly green development? A low-carbon dwelling of some sort? No, a bloody great detached new-build on a toy town estate. With a new Land Rover and BMW 1 Series on the drive. Hmm, not quite immersed themselves in the ethos. Hardly even eco-lite.

So what had they done? They didn't use bleach. Wow. They kept chickens. The chickens did not look very free range, particularly considering the size of their garden which they clearly had no intention of spoiling devoting it to the chickens. These were middle class dinner party greenies. Fakes.

When challenged why they own a 4 wheel drive vehicle, the wet sap of a man had no answer. After a few minutes he realised he did have an answer. He needs to tow a caravan. Hold up. You don't NEED to tow a caravan. If you object to people's abuse of the planet, you can't get yourself off the hook by taking up a pastime which involves lugging a little house around behind your car and cite that as justification. If you want to be green, you probably wouldn't take up caravanning. In the same way that a true environmentalist wouldn't justify lots of international air travel by saying "I like going on foreign holidays".

They were as green as my neighbours lawn (and that's yellow because it was turfed by a cowboy and it is never watered).

And for those who watched the programme, was it just me or did both of the men seem like they would be more likely to have husbands?

2007-05-02T11:45:00.000+01:00

I have concluded that I hate dealing with anyone who is selling me anything. I don't just mean the obvious hassling salesman who ring you up just as you are reaching climatic point in a film (or intercourse), I mean anybody selling me anything.

Buying a car is an awful experience. I liken it to being forceably violated twice. You part-exchange your car: the car you've loved, serviced, looked after, and they offer you peanuts for it. They tell you the leather interior doesn't make it more valuable although the car you are buying is £500 more expensive than the rest because it's got a leather key fob. They tell you they can't give you loads for your old car because there isn't any money in used cars. Then you drive past a week later and it's on the forecourt for three grand more than you traded it in for.

And then they try to sell you every conceivable add-on for the car to make more money out of you. Super paint which means you'll never have to wash it again (do they think I'm completely stupid?), a warranty with a massive excess and costing the same as a new gearbox per year (just who buys these warranties?) or a flexible finance scheme to purchase the car with which means you could have bought a Ferrari Maranello by the time you've paid off your £3000 Fiesta. They may as well just put you on a rack, spin you upside down and wait until your money and gold fillings drop out.

Like when you buy a new TV set. They spend half an hour telling you how good it is then once you've agreed to buy it they spend then next half hour telling you how bad it is so you must buy an extended warranty for when it packs up.

Stereotypically, window, conservatory or anything to do with glazing, salesman are the worst. I'm not just saying this because of it's cliche value, I have experience of one effectively moving in to my house for the night until I bought a conservatory which he wanted to charge me the equivalent of a quarter of the value of my house. And why do they start with a crazy first quote? When they say it will be £24,000 do they think we are stupid when they say "hang on, let me see what I can do" and then they say they can do it for £6,500 if you sign up tonight. These sales techniques are built on lies and people should be shot for employing them.

So we go into a sales showroom as tell them we would like a quote for a conservatory:

"Hi, could you give me a quote for a conservatory please?"
"Of course, we will send someone round"
"It's OK, I've got the measurements with me so could you give me a rough quote now?"
"Oh no sir, we have to send someone round"
"But we're just getting some ideas at the moment and just want a guide price"
"We can't give you a quotation without seeing your house"
"Look, the conservatory will be 3 metres long by 4 metres wide, how much will it cost?"
"We can't say"
[me pointing to fully built conservatory in the showroom] "How much did THAT one cost?"
"Er..."
"How much did THAT one cost. It's about the size of the one we need"
"You can't have that one sir, it's a display model"
"I don't want that one, I just want to know what it cost"
"We'll have to come to your house sir"
"We won't buy one, we're not ready. We just want a ballpark quote"
"That's fine sir"
"Ok, come to my bloody house"

So the night comes and some Foxtons reject turns up in a 3 Series BMW and a tie fatter than Rick Waller's waist. He accepts a cup of tea and delivered a batch of hollow questions as if he gives a toss about our little house and little life, and then sets about measuring up. His measuring technique is so approximate it made my attempt look like I was an experienced Chartered Surveyor.

We explain (again) that tonight is just to get a quote and we won't be ordering anything. He looks at us as if we just started to undress whilst smearing feaces over ourselves. He carries on as if we haven't said this. He starts the mock-price-reduction and I roll my eyes. He doesn't see this because he is too busy pretending to do clever calculations in his massive calculator although I can see he is just working out how to make it spell BOOBLESS when it's turned upside down.

He reveals his if-you-sign-up-tonight quote and we say, again, we aren't signing up tonight. He convinces himself that we are haggling and gets his calculator out again.

Now I know that this guy is earning a living but there are other ways and his pushy sales technique isn't pleasant so I have minimal sympathy for him.

He makes it clear by the way he is sitting that he isn't planning to leave until we either buy his hideously overpriced plastic and glass box or the sun rises.

After repeating ourselves until I start looking for blunt objects to strike him with he eventually turns grumpy. The shiny-smily salesman now starts behaving as if WE have wasted his time. I explain that I told the salesperson in the shop and him on numerous occasions that we wouldn't be buying anything tonight. This appears to be a surprise to him as he snatches his junior school quality presentation folder and demonstration window and barely says goodbye, tripping on our step as he leaves.

Wouldn't it have been a lot easier if the person in the showroom had just said "about ten grand"?

2007-04-16T16:17:00.000+01:00

A couple on the train this morning were having an argument. It's quite unusual to see commuters travelling as a couple and even more unusual to see them rowing.

The spectacle was enhanced by them not raising their voices. In fact, I didn't hear a word they said but I could see the anger and frustration they were experiencing by not being able to shout. The straight jacket of a train full of nosey commuters muzzled them into a stifled conflict. He kicked off the argument and she wasn't keen to have the discussion on the train although she stopped rooting down her bag when he came in with the opening shot. He had said something so controversial or stupid she stopped in her tracks. She bit back with frowny whispers and his mouth remained open as he digested her response with astonishment. She tried to close the discussion by putting her head to one side as if to settle for a sleep. I don't know what he said to re-light the fire but it was enough to start the whisper fight again. After much hushed heat shaking, eye rolling, jaw dropping, frowning and sighing, they gave up and faced away from each other. All done in almost complete silence.

In the end they only stopped because I think they were worried their eyes would pop out because they were unable to shout. When we reached the end of the line he got off first and she followed. Once out in the open and more able to discuss, oddly they chose not to.

I didn't like to stare too much because he looked like a bit of a nutter. I speculated that had they been in their living room at home he would probably have beaten her up so maybe it was best for all that they were on the train into the City.

2007-03-06T16:24:00.001Z

Have you seen that BUPA advertisement? Now stupid people will watch that and think how wonderful BUPA is but what are they really *actually* saying? Amongst other similar claims they say -

"We can help you been seen and treated as quickly as possible"

So could the NHS.

So could my gran.

The point here is that they say "as quickly as possible". So if three-quarters of their doctors were out of the lash the night before and they are all sleeping off their hangovers with the student nurses, then their "quickly as possible" won't be very quick. But it will still be as quickly as possible.

They also offer a "clean" hospital. Now I know the NHS has come in for critisicm over recent years but I would say facilities are generally clean. If all BUPA can offer is a service as quick as they can offer and a hospital which isn't dirty then I think I'll save my £80 a month.

Horizontal bike

2007-02-22T15:17:00.001Z

Horizontal bike
Originally uploaded by kamshots.

What is the purpose of those horizontal bicycles other than to kill the rider? I went to cross the road today and just luckily noticed this crab on wheels almost run my toes over as he whizzed past me. And this fella didn't even have one of those silly flags they have sticking out the back of them like the toy cars they give to kids in supermarkets so mummy can see where little Timmy is. Not that they do much good. Surely they are as safe as crawling along in a busy road and lying in front of a Range Rover?

Why do people ride them? Is it just to be Mr Whacky and Quirky? They don't look very relaxing or easy to ride but maybe they are. They look like bloody hard work.

And then I saw someone commuting on a unicycle. I tried to get a photo but I was laughing too much. Now surely he is doing it for the sheer wackiness? I mean it isn't like he was getting home particularly quickly. Although he is at head height I would still feel pretty vulnerable being on a unicycle riding through central London.

And finally, just this week I saw a fully grown man in a suit riding to work on a chrome mini-scooter. I just don't know what more I can say.

2007-02-14T15:02:00.001Z

DSC00002
Originally uploaded by masha3r.q6r.

I'm a big fan of Martin Lewis and his MoneySavingExpert website. I like the way he finds out the best deals and also the way he clearly explains things.

I am starting to worry that his dislike for the money organisations is going a step to far to screw them over. For example, in his latest 'mutterings' he says:

Free £100 loophole from Lloyds TSB. It'll take some work, but it's fun!
Lloyds TSB's new 'Save the change' for new and existing customers, rounds up all the change from everything you spend. E.g. pay £2.12 and £3 is debited from your current account and 88p deposited in a savings account. Better still, for Feb and March it'll match all the savings up to £50/month. So up to £100 of free cash is available if you're prepared to play (e.g. fill your car with £8.01 petrol).

Now I don't suppose there is anything wrong with his telling people to do this but he is rather screwing the bank over by explaining to people not bright enough to work it out for themselves that there is a good deal to be had.

Similarly, there was an promotional campaign by a baked bean manufacturer recently whereby they had stands at shopping centres and people could exchange their 'other' brand beans for the ones they were promoting. His suggestion was to go to a cheapie supermarket and buy up a whole shed-load of beans and trade them up for the better, more expensive ones. Again, technically there is nothing wrong with this but I don't see why the company doing the promotion deserve Martin Lewis trying to ruin it for them.

I can see reasons behind some of his campaigns against greedy organisations which are screwing us out of our money but in many cases he encourages people to abuse special offers at any cost to the organisations offering them. Will it be that he will end up getting consumers a WORSE deal in the end when they stop doing special offers because some smartypants has found a loophole? Why do you think most credit cards charge a balance transfer fee now? I was quite happy juggling the money between cards until some clever-clogs went and told everyone...

LA Ballers

2007-02-14T09:14:00.001Z

LA Ballers
Originally uploaded by Tman2396.

I wonder how much of the quality of this shot is down to expensive equipment. Not taking anything away from the photographer: it's a fantastic capture.

She's A Rainbow

2007-02-14T09:13:00.001Z

She's A Rainbow
Originally uploaded by oybay.

When you browse Flickr you start to realise that those pictures you took maybe aren't quite as good as you thought.

The standard is so high these days...

2007-02-12T16:29:00.000Z

At a wedding reception at the weekend and had to endure the painful sight of watching people dance. I don't know why it makes me so uncomfortable: possibly because they look so stupid.

I was watching one pair of girls who were *really* getting into it. They were doing that thing where you sort of jig up to your friend's face singing the playing song and get right up close to their face and then jig backwards with an almost 'I'm a serious dancer' face on. And of course, it doesn't help when the aforementioned dancers look like pigs in lipstick.

Then there are the blokes who are a little bit too full of themselves. Dancing like noone is watching is a motto dreamt up by someone with few friends. They dance like they have seen boybands dance but look like a retarded MC Hammer. They are drunk so the potential for clashing with the Jiggy Girls is high.

And then there is the couple who dance like mad but do it with style. They can't dance any better than anyone else but they are just dancing to have fun rather than to look cool.

And then there are the blokes who stand there sipping pints all night. Bloody cool bunch they are too.

El Chivo, Shoreditch, East London

2007-02-12T15:01:00.001Z

El Chivo, Shoreditch, East London
Originally uploaded by ro_jo_sul.

I think this is why I like street art so much. You walk around and then stumble across something interesting.

2007-02-08T14:33:00.001Z

I was planning to sell some trousers on eBay but having put this off for ages I decided it isn't worth risking my exemplary feedback score, so I decided not to bother. This was going to be the listing:

Trousers of Denial Size 34 or 36

I am selling a smart pair of trousers which do not fit me and have been very slightly altered in a feeble attempt to make them fit me. They still don't fit me. They might fit you.

Normally a wearer of a 36" waist I was finding that trousers were a little loose around the waist and having not altered my exercise regime or my diet I can only imagine that my body is able to burn off KFC Variety Meals more efficiently now. Either that or I have worms. Whatever, I was confident that my next pair of trousers would reflect my new found slender physique and would be of the 34" waist variety.

Being a cautious chap, I still tried them on in the shop as visiting any high street at any time is torture enough, so to have to return to exchange them would be unbearable. So off I trot to the mecca of the office worker to get some new slacks. Once in Next I find a nice pair, bravely select the 34" waist pair, briefly pausing to scoff at the 36" pair hanging heavily on the next rail waiting for some overweight office podge to waddle up to buy them. I flutter off the changing room to slip into the strides.

All seems well. I stand in the changing room looking in the mirror, left, right and obligatory over-the-shoulder-look-at-my-backside. I continue with the standard trouser-trying-on-procedure by rubbing the front of the trousers with both hands and then doing the same across by buttocks whilst leaning forward slightly looking over my shoulder in a Maryln Monroe style.

This was looking good. The trousers fitted and although slightly tighter around the middle than I'm used to, that is only to be expected on a slightly smaller size. Purchase made. Deal done.

Next morning I confidently slip my new strides on and it's off the station. Check out the man about town.

Here is where I realise my trouser-trying-on-procedure was flawed as at no point did I sit down whilst wearing the trousers. As I sat down on the train my gentlemans marbles were compressed like one of those rubber stress relief toys you squeeze in your fist. I let out a faint, yet audible, whimper and spent the next hour trying to rearrange myself without looking like I was trying to arouse myself (if challenged, my defence was going to be that there was simply no room for that sort of activity in the available trouser fabric).

I spent the rest of the day in meetings wriggling in my seat as if I had some vicious venereal disease or something very wrong with my anus.

The journey home was equally bad and by the time I got home I was even talking like Russell Brand. The swine.

So that night, faced with the prospect of returning the trousers I decided to make a tiny alternation myself. Just to give myself that little bit more room in the middle area, I would move the button along. A few hours later once I had put the thread through the needle I set about removing the button. A few hours later once I had removed the button I set about sewing it back on in a more generous position. A few hours later I had finished and it was time for work.

Weary, I tried on the trousers. Although the button was now moved, once I did up the zip it grabbed my crotch again. And it bunched up the fabric. And when I sat down I still yelped.

Undeterred I set off for work the next day in my hybrid 34/36 inchers. I spent another day writhing in my seat as if plagued with crabs and by the end of that day actually believed I was Justin Hawkins.

So that's what is on offer: A pair of very-nearly-new trousers. Marked up as 34" and amended to 36". To get them back to 34" all that is needed is for someone to move the button back. Or just use the hook catch and ignore the button. Serious bidders only please. Just don't kid yourself you're a 34" if you aint.

Starting price £0.99

Do you think I would have sold them?

2007-02-05T11:19:00.001Z

I saw two different types of campaigners today.

Firstly, a bunch of people from the Carbon Trust. They were all congregating round Moorgate with their matching Carbon Trust jackets (his puts them on a level of coolness with Alan Partridge straight away). Now I'm sure it isn't a very original thought but consider the fact they had all arrived in a hired Ford Transit van. Now I'm no eco-warrior but shouldn't they have come on the Tube or the bus or a manure powered hovver-board or something? I bet they left a big footprint (why do they love that word so much?).

The second campaigner I saw was an old lady (maybe 70) pushing one of those shopping baskets on wheels. On the front of the shopping basket was a full size plastic sign which said "NO to ID Cards". I genuinely don't understand what the fuss is about and even more so, I don't understand why a 70 year old lady should be so bothered. By the time I am 70, the last thing I am going to start doing is spending my last years moaning about some Government initiative which I am unlikely to actually see brought in while I'm still above ground. And what is the problem with ID cards anyway? Everyone complains about illegal immigrants and hooded terrorists and then something which might go a little way to helping is condemned by people complaining about their 'human rights'. I have often wondered why we don't have out DNA taken at birth. Why not? Wouldn't that help solve crimes? Is that a breach of human rights? At the moment you only get your finger prints taken if you've been caught for something. So you don't get on the database until you've been caught once.

That got a bit ranty.

I wanted to talk about Louis Theroux's Las Vegas documentary but I'll have to get back to you on that.

2007-02-02T15:48:00.000Z

Some days I just can't bear the commute. I just can't bear sharing body warmth with a hairy eared middle-manager all the way into London. I can't bear bumping into the paupers hunting through the train once it's in the station, looking for an un-creased copy of The Times. I can't bear walking across the main concourse of one of Londons busiest stations feeling like I am the only one walking in that particular direction. I can't bear fighting through the crowd of people queuing up for a free pot of Soya yoghurt at the station. I can't bear saying no thanks to the twat in army camouflage trying to sell me a weekend paint-balling with a bunch of Territorial Army losers. I can't bear saying no thanks to the little Chinese lady who wants to give me a copy of Ms London. I can't bear to point out to her (every day) that I am a Mr not a Ms.

I can't bear to cross the London streets only to have some Lycra-clad florescent hippie side-swipe me as he sails a red light. I can't bear to get in the lift at work and have one of the ignorant gimps from the top floor grunt at me when I ask which floor they want. I can't bear to contest with the work firewall and the Draconian rules it enforces over my Internet viewing. I can't bear to do any work. I can't bear to fight my way home back across London when the flow of people seems to be opposite to my route. I can't bear to be smacked in the groin by some overweight office dolly's Marks & Spencer bag. I can't bear to stand on the train all the way home just wishing someone would get off at the next stop. I can't bear to watch that sad man keep tipping forwards and snap back into position as he drifts in and out of his public slumber.

Then I close the door behind myself and I'm home. It's all forgotten and sanity is restored.

I can't bear hearing the alarm at 6am...

2007-01-30T09:08:00.000Z

Email is just one huge leap backwards in communication.

Let's imagine that email was invented before the telephone. People wrote messages to each other, clicked send and waited for a reply. Sometime days. People misunderstood the tone of someones message because it was written rather than spoken and there was always that worry the email never arrived.

Then, let's imagine, someone invented the telephone. Imagine the media hype - a machine which allows you to SPEAK to someone on the other side of town or the world in REAL-TIME! Amazing. No more lost emails or waiting ages for a response, the telephone would change the way we communicate for ever. Email would be obsolete.

So why has email become so popular? It's utterly useless. People sit in offices staring across the room at people whilst writing emails to them. People send emails which, had they been spoken, would not be considered the slightest bit funny but because they are in an email the sender feels the need to share it with all 64 people in their address book. Companies give out email addresses for Customer Services so they can ignore them. It's purely passive and perfectly pointless.

Email takes longer to write than a phone call takes to make. Email makes people slaves to their screens when they could be communicating properly with people. Email makes grown men spend entire train journeys thumbing through their inbox just to check whether their equally lifeless boss has emailed them.

Email is pointless.

2007-01-24T15:10:00.000Z

Today I won't moan.

Today it was cold but I won't moan. I walked through the park I walk through every day, except today it was covered in snow. It doesn't snow very often in London so it was a bit of an unusual sight. Normally the park is empty but for a few (million) pigeons. But this morning in the bright, crisp air, were about 20 children playing in the snow.

Now I'm not going to say they were little swines who threw snowballs at me because they didn't. They were just little kids with their folks, making snowmen and playing in the snow.

It made a nice change.

See.

2007-01-22T13:07:00.000Z

Why do people say "pardon me" after doing those silent indigestion burps? You can't hear them so why ask to be excused? You wouldn't do that if you silently passed wind and generated the sort of smell you would expect opening a tomb of halitosis suffering skunks would you? Of course not, you would look all sheepish and stay schtum. Why draw attention to the fact you have burped? Isn't that actually worse manners?

Just be quiet.

2007-01-19T16:10:00.001Z

I was reading more idiotic ramblings on the Internet about graffiti artists today. You just can't beat reading things to make your blood boil. This time I was reading the opinions of train drivers about the recent Tube deaths in Braking on the Transport Forum.

To quote 2 of the members:

"DLA 365: So if OZONE and WANTS are eliminated, it means NASTY is still on the loose. Darn - the rails should have got him too."

"Routemaster J: I haven't had a chance to respond to this topic yet, but I'd like to say good riddance too"

So these people (and many others) are actually wishing death on these graffiti writers for painting the trains. I find this astonishing. I can see how they can complain about their behaviour, disagree with what they are doing but to think them DYING is a fitting punishment for their actions is beyond comprehension.

I have immense sympathy for the driver of the train but I think those young lads have paid the ultimate price for that. Don't stamp on them now they are already permanently down.

In other graffiti news, I read that Banksy is having another sale to bulge his bank balance even further. I don't know if it is newspaper sensationalism but they suggested that his canvas 'Glory' has a guide price of £167,000 but is expected to reach £500,000. NOW tell me Banksy isn't a sell out.

2007-01-19T09:59:00.000Z

This week I have been bugged by Paper Pikeys. You know who I mean, the people who, once the train has reached it's destination, go in and out of the empty carriages picking up the discarded newspapers. They fascinate me but I can't bring myself to talk to them as they frighten me. I saw one this morning. As I was hauling myself out of my seat and about to drag myself onto the cold platform, I watched a fully grown man leaf through a paper left on a seat like a hunter ravaging his fresh kill. It was as if he was searching for the secret of the universe or the meaning of life whereas all he was actually doing was checking noone had done the crossword.

It's not like they are dressed in tattered rags and scruffy hair, these people are dressed in suits like the rest of us (well, most of "us"). I feel like asking them how much they earn. Asking them if they are so badly paid they can't afford a copy of The Sun in the morning. Or are they just so hideously thrifty that they see buying a paper brand new an unnecessary luxury? Do they watch the television through their neighbours windows?

And what fascinates me more is the Paper Pikeys who collect multiple papers. One woman I see most days races in and out of the emptying carriages frantically searching for complete newspapers. By the time she gets to the barriers, her bag is bulging with her tabloid bounty. But why? Why does she need 8 copies of The Mirror? Who are they for? Why does she get in my way so often? Is it OK to give her a little kick when she cuts me up?

I have a couple of ideas for dealing with them. To lay a trap. Buy a newspaper and keep it in pristine condition throughout the journey. Except for a few subtle alterations. On certain pages I will add some offensive comments in black ink blending in with the pages so they will only be noticed on reading the paper. Some schoolboy comments are essential (must I give examples?) but the main additions will be comments such as "this paper is stolen by the blonde lady" or "recycled by a tight-wad". Then when the papers are recycled all will be revealed.

Or to catch them all like a net load of Alaskan crabs. As they are all ferreting for their free papers, we need to instruct the driver to close the doors. They'll panic like a slow contestant on the Crystal Maze and they'll be trapped. Then with no hesitation, move the train off of the platform and take it to the depot. Here they will have time to reflect on their stinginess and lack of consideration for the mass of people they obstruct when they are getting on the train and the rest of the rational population are getting off.

At least they'll have plenty to read until we decide what to do with them.

2007-01-17T13:57:00.001Z

So graffiti is back in the news again (and thankfully it isn't because Banksy has just launched another money spinning circus). Two young lads were killed painting a train at Barking Station over the weekend. It's a tragic story whatever your opinion of what they were doing is.

Reading comments on the Going Underground blog just makes me angry. People write comments like "good riddance" and they aren't in a minority. You would think these youngsters had committed mass genocide, were convicted peodophiles or serial killers. They were just young kids doing something very stupid and very dangerous which went tragically wrong. Sure, I'm biased because I have an interest in graffiti writing but I'm a rational and (self-proclaimed) intelligent person. What they were doing was wrong but it doesn't make them "low-life scum".

When someone like Leah Betts died from Ecstasy why did this get the public's sympathy? Why didn't people chastise her for taking an illegal drug? The Government have made a big deal about anti-social behaviour in recent years and anyone wearing a hooded top is now branded a thug and vandal who you wouldn't let near your grandmother. This bad rep going out about the youngsters is seeping into the publics perception of them all. Sure there are nasty kids out there but there always have been.

I guess my point is to keep what happened in proportion and let's not use it to condemn a nation of youngsters. Graffiti is an art but not worth dying for.

Thoughts out to Daniel Elgar and Bradley Chapman. Ozone. Wise. Wants.

2007-01-15T16:54:00.000Z

It's literally everywhere.

It isn't just because I recently wrote about abuse of words that I keep hearing people use the word literally. They really are using it a lot. As I sit in my office listening to someone explaining a new system to a new recruit, all I hear is "you literally just click here and it literally runs the report". I don't think you need to tell them every time you are being literal. It has crept into our language like a disease.

I always enjoy watching programmes which feature 'real' people. I like Wife Swap (although I know it is heavily produced). I like those Jeremy Kyle programmes just for the cringe value. And I am watching Big Brother with interest. The producers must have thought they had won the lottery when Jade Goody's mum agreed to be on the show. Unaware that she is as rough around the edges as a piece of glass wrapped in sandpaper, she is already letting herself down. She makes Jade look thoughtful and intelligent. The scenes last night when Jades mum claimed to be unable to pronounce Shilpa which was (quite rightly) offending Shilpa. This is the same sort of mentality that makes people claim to dislike 'foreign' food without trying it. The word Shilpa is no probably harder to pronounce than Davina (well, there's one more syllable) but Jade's mum just couldn't manage it. I think Jade's mum gave herself away when she just started to refer to her as 'the Indian'. Daft racist.

Now Leo has shown that years of building up a rapport with the British public through his funny hair and cheeky smiles can be wiped out like a tornado across the Caribbean by a few days in the Big Brother house, I think it will become a bit dull. The only thing keeping me watching is that sometimes the sides of Jade's mouth actually touch her ears.

2007-01-04T15:23:00.000Z

I happened to pass the new Foxtons office in Islington today. For those outside of the UK, Foxtons sell houses. I don't think I have ever seen such a close concentration of hideous people. From the moment you see the shiny new glass-fronted building you are tricked into thinking it is something nice like a modern art gallery or an overly trendy fashion house. Then you see people sitting in odd shaped brightly coloured furniture pouring over a laptop in the window. For a moment you speculate that these are young designers creating the next architecural materpiece on their Mac.

But then something appears odd. The man, well, boy, holding the laptop, is dressed so sharply he is in danger of cutting his already jaggedly snipped hair. His tie is far too wide to be considered a serious acompaniment to any outfit outside of a travelling circus. Then a look into the distance reveals two rows of these clones, each draped in hideeously clashing combinations or checked shirts, garish ties and modern-punk hair-dos. These aren't normal people. They are City Estate Agents.

It all becomes clear once they are viewed as a collective. A patchwork quilt of greed and aftershave. They had cleverly hidden their Minis (probably under their desks). Through the glass you can see most of them on their phones and their faces changing by the second from a false 'I hope this makes my voice sound genuine down the phone' smile, to a disinterested glaze probably prompted by the purchaser on the other end of the phone not mentioning money for 4 seconds.

Lots of industries work hard to break sterotypes but thanks to the likes of Foxtons they have changed it from estate agents being lazy to estate agents being young, greedy and equipped with a worse dress sense than the Earl of Longleat. I'd have stuck with being called lazy.

(I found a like minded soul on Flickr!)

2007-01-02T10:51:00.000Z

The festive period has historically been a good time for graffiti artists. Staff numbers at railway depots are low which gives the writers that extra time to do their business. It's taken about 15 years but the British Transport Police have now realised this and this year they were poised in the depots to catch the writers. So what makes this funny is that both Brixton and Camden Underground stations got a complete graffiti makeover. While the Police were guarding the yards, the writers were hitting the stations.

What they actually did I am in 2 minds about. As someone who still follows the graf scene and has done for 15 years my first reaction was to give a nod of approval. They have stuck it to the authorities, got up, got publicity and got out. But the general quality of the art wasn't great. But it's all about getting up isn't it?

When I actually look at what they did, a lot of it is just tags and throws which if you did in a train depot more than once or twice you would have made it too hot to return to for a long time. But then to put in context, these are established writers loose in a deserted Underground station. Kids in a sweetshop stuff.

If they wanted to get the publics approval for graffiti art then that wasn't the way to do it. But that wasn't what they were trying to do.

The Grafwar piece at Brixton does show the talent these people have. This didn't make it into the media coverage about the "vandalism".

I also like the Dirty Tunnel Bunnies story on the Tube map. It shows a sense of humour, a sense of fun and contradicts the rest of the messages which are mainly taunts at the Britsh Transport Police. It's reminoscent of the notes writers used to put next to pieces painted on the New York subway trains: "My Mom told me to stay home but did I listen? Hell no".

Credit to Matt Seppings on Flickr! for the photos

The average person sees this as pure vandalism and after all, it is, but try to appreciate the planning which went into this mission in the same way as people readily respect people like the Great Train Robbers or the Krays who were good at what they did but *what* they did was much worse than paint a station wall.

2006-12-15T13:54:00.000Z

I don't claim to be a connoisseur of the English language but I think I am in comparison with the Neanderthals I find myself communicating with on a day to day basis. I can narrow it down to particular words. Words which are either overused or wrongly used. I give you:

Basically
Literally
Obviously
Everythink (sic)
Nothink (sic)

It is very easy to start overusing the first of those three words. I've found I myself doing it. If you open every sentence with the word 'basically' I think you are telling the person you are talking to that they lack the intelligence to comprehend something which is not basic. Similarly, overuse of the word obviously does seem to imply that you didn't actually need to speak as what you have said is 'obvious'. So if everything you say is basic and obvious you should probably just shut up.

I heard a stand-up comedian talking about the word 'literally' who summed it up very well (I heard him on the FrankWit podcast - who was it Andy?). If you were frightened and say you "literally" shit yourself than that means you *actually* shit yourself. That isn't what you mean is it? If something was very funny then you may well have "literally cried with laughter" but I doubt you "literally pissed yourself". If you did then you should go out less.

And maybe I have complained about 'everythink' and 'nothink' before. Where did the 'k' come from? Russell Brand can use it (he knows he's doing it) but anyone else just needs to remember that tend to be pronounced how they are written. So something ending -ing is unlikely to take on a 'K' sound.

And furthermore, why do these offenders (and they are usually serial offenders) misuse the tense so hideously? "We was going to go to the park". "We WAS?", "WE WAS?". A visiting German can speak better English than that. When you were at school I can see how it wouldn't be cool to speak in the perfect Queen's English but when you hit the outside world with grown-ups I think it's best to raise your game. Otherwise people will think you are very stupid. Or maybe you are?

May I demonstrate with "A night out with Neanderthals":
"Obviously, what we was going to do was go down the pub and Dave was going to bring everythink we needed. Dave was late. Obviously this was because he missed the bus but we was sitting in the pub not knowing nothink. Dave literally came flying through the door an hour late and he basically said it was all down to missing the bus. We was going to get the bus but we walked."

2006-12-12T17:00:00.000Z

I'm currently enjoying the TV marketing campaign of Parker pens. It's amazing. I can see how advertising agencies manage to market a new car by associating it with a lifestyle and the type of person you want to be. I can see the same with other things like designer clothes and perfumes. But pens? Pens? Surely impossible.

In the current TV advert we see an arrow flying around showing glamorous locations across the world. The viewer is poised. What could this product be? I want it. I want to be that jetsettter. Then we realise that to get this, to get all of this excitement, all we need to do is buy a pen. Amazing. This pen is going to change my life.

Does this work? Does this make people think that what used to be one of the dullest purchases you can make after toilet roll and bleach, that buying a pen is now a lifestyle choice? Did those dark-rimmed-glasses-wearing-brown-shirt-and-side-burns-sporting advertising gurus really belive they could pull it off? I guess only sales will tell. But then they've been paid so who cares.

2006-12-11T16:18:00.001Z

It is the time of year for contrived fun. Great.

I can manage the whole family-life fun around Christmas because it *is* fun but *must* I have fun with my colleagues? Every year I have less and less enthusiasm for work-based festivities. It's not like you can actually have any fun. Decide to let your hair down and you spend January hiding from people you offended/molested at the Christmas party hoping they have somehow had their memories vacuumed since the office bash.

It really is awful: small talk with senior management, watching people dance badly, watching people drink too much, seeing the androids devoid of personality the whole year suddenly burst into embarrassing life in a mess of dance and enjoyment. It's like watching your Dad dance only much worse. Your boss trying to show he's cool by being the absolute opposite. The team secretary having too much to drink, getting too close and having to take a sharp poke in the eye to prevent her smudging that hideously think lipstick on your shirt which will be impossible to explain when you get home. Control yourself. The traffic light DJ spinning the same records he spins every year to a room full of middle-aged idiots dancing their little hearts out. Everything is wrong. Just stop it. We're grown-ups now.

And is it fun? Is it fun to worry every second about offending some top brass? To let slip the comment about their fat belly which you have been suppressing in the 73 meetings you have had with them over the last 12 months? Or comment on the halitosis of the internal auditor a little bit too loudly and not be quite sure whether he has heard it or not. And then worry about this until April.

So I'm a grumpy old bore. Well no, I just like to enjoy myself my way and not in company time. That and the fact that after 3 pints I know I'm heading for a hangover which feels like my head is full of sand so I'd just rather give it a miss. I don't want to be that white-faced weakling on the train in the morning with his head in between his legs threatening to vomit over the whole carriage at any point because he had one too many glasses of vinegar quality wine at the office do. No, not me. I'm going home. Just give me the annual leave and the bonus and keep your office party.

2006-12-06T16:52:00.001Z

Whilst I don't live for comments on this 'ere blog, I was rather disheatened when I stopped getting any. Turns out I was getting them all along, it's just Bloggers stupid comment verification was switched on so I wasn't seeing any of them. Maybe I was emailed to say there were comments and those emails went into the spam hole. So apologies if you've commented and I ignored you. Blame Google.

2006-12-06T10:02:00.000Z

I listened to (some) of the Russell Brand interview with Morrissey on the BBC Radio 2 Podcast today. I don't really have an opinion on Morrissey as I've never been into his music. I know a lot of people worship him and these often happen to be the sort of people who look like they need a week in Spain and a good roast dinner. But that's ok.

Given Morrissey's reputation for being a bit of a grump, I was a bit surprised to hear Brand was interviewing him. Maybe he respected his hair-do. The interview started well and I thought Morrissey was being alright and started to wonder why people give him such a hard time. But then he started saying odd things. He started being deliberately and pointlessly 'different'. Trying immensely hard to be non-conformist. The main example was when he said he hated Jamie Oliver because he cooks dead animals. When Brand followed this up by inquiring as to him still taking his strict vegetarian stance, Morrissey replied that he is not a vegetarian. "A vegan?", Brand asks, to which Morrissey replies in the negative saying that he just doesn't eat animals because he's "a bit peckish". Listen Morrissey, someone who doesn't eat meat is called a vegetarian. You may object to labels and conformism but I'm afraid if you don't eat meat, and you do eat vegetables then you, yes you, oh ghostly one, are a vegetarian. Just because there are some vegetable dishes you don't like, that doesn't mean you're not a vegetarian. Blokes that put out fires are called firemen, people who make bread are called bakers and pasty-faced goths who don't eat meat are called vegetarians.

And furthermore, Mr Morrissey, you do 'perform'. When Brand asked about him performing on stage he was immediately corrected: "seals perform". Yes Morrissey, seals do perform and so do car tyres in the wet and so do singers. Or do you not want to be called a singer? Should we call you a "voice melodifier"?

I turned off after this. Brand was talking to his hero and if I was him I would have been left thinking that the last half hour had just been spent with a self-important idiot.

I look forward to seeing the vegetarian perform again soon.

2006-10-04T09:39:00.000+01:00

Lunchtimes on a sunny autumnal day in London are a buzz with people dealing
with their real lives over their mobile phones. The 1 hour each day that
people get to break free from the open plan office where everyone hears
every word they say. So they take to the streets where everyone hears
every word they say. An hour to sort things out.

As I walked around Hatton Garden yesterday, I'm fascinated by the 2 seconds
insights I get into other people's lives. "...so that's what I always do
is it?..." snaps one office girl into her Mororola. An arguement with a
long term boyfriend, husband, mother? Whoever it is, she has chosen to
spend her hour of freedom arguing with them.

"...tell them 50 and we'll take that" says one suited and booted man
outside The Goose. Much harder to understand that one. I should have
lingered. What was he talking about?

If you stop to look around any busy lunchtime office arena, you'll see it
is awash with people on their phones, scurrying around like ants being
pursued by a kettle of water. Pret in one hand, Sony Ericsson in the other
as they arrange their mortgages, their evenings and everything which the
confines of the 9-5 prevent them doing.

Then it's back to the office with a hot ear for a few more hours. Well
someone has to pay that mobile bill.

2006-09-22T09:16:00.000+01:00

So Banksy has 'cracked America'. Great. I've grumbled about his popularity
before and whilst I am pleased for him pulling in hundreds of thousands of
pounds by selling his pieces to celebrities, I do think the graffiti
community have lost a member.

His work is clever, politically aware and funny and I am sure that is why
it has such wide appeal although no-one was predicting he would become so
big so fast. If we knew that, we'd have paid £500 for his prints a year
ago which are worth 3 or more times that now. I didn't expect it because I
thought being mainstream was what Banksy was all about being against. Even
now, his digs at Paris Hilton for making huge amounts of money putting
buyers even further "out of her league" every time they buy a CD seems to
sit slightly uncomfortably coming from someone who sold £200,000 worth of
art to Angelina Jolie this week. That puts him out of my league. If Paris
is a publicity whore then doesn't that mean Banksy is?

More recently he has done larger, media grabbing pieces rather than the
smaller ones he became famous for. Now he is such a valuable commodity I
can't see him risking getting caught by spending a night painting little
rats across the city. I love the pieces, I just want to keep the old
Banksy alive. I remember walking past the 'old skool pensioners' piece and
just being so glad to have stumbled across it. I expect someone is there
right now with a bulldozer and angle grinder trying to take it away to
adorn their grotesquely overpriced Clerkenwell loft. I don't think that is
what Banksy set out to represent but I wonder how he feels about his cult
status now.

When asked about celebrities buying his works he obviously had a cleverly
constructed response along the lines of it being preferable for people to
be famous for their art collections rather than the art collections being
famous because of who owns them. The Times suggested he had made around
USD$3 million from his recent exhibition. Good going.

As I have said before, I hate the fact that people I work with know about
Banksy (people I work with may include geeks). Celebrities are flocking to
his show in LA probably because he is a British person heavy on political
satire. He is hideously trendy here and in the States. He is in all of
the papers. Dare I say he has sold out? Did he try to, or did it just
happen? He doesn't seem to have tried to stop it.

He is a master of marketing and very good at what he does. The Disney
stunt was clever as it hits a huge American institution and was sure to
make the media. Same with Paris Hilton, she is a big star who makes the
papers walking to the launderette so someone tampering with 500 copies of
her CD is going to go worldwide.

I don't want to sound like I'm completely slagging him off but I feel he
has moved into a different category of artist now. He isn't a graffiti
artist. What next Banksy, an entry in the Tuner Prize?

2006-09-06T12:08:00.000+01:00

Surely the McDonalds Pound Saver menu should be called the Pound Spender menu?

2006-08-31T12:42:00.000+01:00

As someone who has followed the works of Banksy for many years, I'm
starting to find myself question what he is all about. Banksy has always
been known by graffiti writers, but the average bloke in the street would
never have heard of him a few years ago. Now he seems to be something of a
mainstream artist. Regularly appearing on the BBC News website and in the
press for his works I wonder whether he isn't turning into what he always
campaigns against - a marketable brand. He may say that painting on a
bridge is him showing his freedom as an unconventional artist and writer
rather than presenting in a gallery, but now that most of his significant
works reach the press by the next day, isn't he just building up his
portfolio just in a slightly different way? All of this publicity is
clearly paying off as the likes of Robbie Williams and Christine Aguilera
are paying silly money for his canvasses - so is he selling out? Sure, he
turns down Nike but if his canvasses are selling for ten grand a pop then
he can afford to. I'm starting to struggle to see the difference between a
giant Just Do It advertisement and a giant Banksy stencil. Each are
selling something.

Maybe that is the point which bugs me: he's making money. That isn't what
graffiti was about in the old days but it certainly is now. Many of the
old New York writers make money from legal murals now and many large towns
have local writers who get paid to do murals so Banksy isn't really any
different. But for some reason his increased marketability smacks of
hypocrisy. Walking round Shoreditch is a shrine to the now hideously
fashionable status of Banksy only serving to add to his
marketability. Hats off to him, he's doing very well from it.

Maybe I'm bitter. It's like following a band who you know are excellent
but are yet to hit the mainstream. Then they make it big and you go off
them. They've sold out. Everyone is talking about "your" band.

He is doing the same thing in The States. Lots of new works have been
popping up in LA over the last few months and, low and behold, he has an
exhibition starting there soon. Maybe this is normal self-promotion which
all artists need to do but it all seems a bit too contrived and calculated
for me and not the behaviour of a random writer.

Take me back to the days when I can be walking down a London backstreet and
see a tiny stencil of a rat hanging from a ledge and knowingly smile to
myself because Banksy put that there just for me.

2006-06-02T08:56:00.000+01:00

I still don't get this whole Sodoku business. I just don't see the attraction. Why would you want to spend the whole day at work solving problems and using your brain only to sit on the train and do it some more?

And why do I have to look at these problem hungry nerds looking vacantly to the sky as they ponder such critical decisions as whether to put a 6 or a 9 in that little box in their silly little pocket book?

Are these people so problem starved that they need the methadone of Soduku to give them something to worry about? Maybe rather than working through their "500 Hideously Hard Sudokus for Saddos" they should offer to take some of the problems of their fellow commuters from them. Surely it would be more productive to help Geoff sort out his marriage or give Tracey a hand with the seating arrangements for the wedding rather than filling a pointless book with pointless numbers.

I have even seen these Sodoku books in hardback. What is the point of that? Will the Puzzle Wizard put it on the bookshelf when he gets home and refer back to it in the future? On cold winter evenings will he head for the Soduku Annual and reminisce those crazy days when he demolished three puzzles in one sitting?

2006-04-24T15:11:00.000+01:00

Some days it all goes nicely. And you thought because it is Monday I was going to moan didn't you? Yes I'm tired. No I don't want to be at work, but today things fell nicely.

Train rolls in on time and the seat on it's own is empty. It's mine. Nice.
Train arrives at mainline station on time. Nice.
Noone bumps into me on the way to work. Unusual.
In fact, some people smile at me (I checked as soon as I got to work and I didn't have toothpaste on my cheek)
Just as I don't know what to listen to on my headphones, Jay-Z Dirt of Your Shoulder comes on. Quality.
The lift is waiting for me at the bottom when I arrive at work. I ride up to Jay-Z.
I only have 7 emails from the weekend to deal with and 6 of them are phising scams.
My first meeting of the day is unusually short.

In other news, I am addicted to Flikr. There are some amazing photos on there. I fear I will be devoting a lot of my life to that site over the coming months.

I see that eBay are doing reviews on their site now. I normally don't care for unedited reviewers comments but I read a really good one for digital cameras - it's all good advice.

2006-04-21T10:31:00.000+01:00

I'm still having trouble with people who walk slowly and meander across the pavement. I think I would be well within my rights to kick them up the arse to get them out of the way but after consideration I think that may be rude. So I'm thinking of leapfrogging people. This week, a few of the slow meanderers have been particularly small, and I think, with a bit of a run up I could leapfrog them. How scared would they be? I think it is the only way they will learn. If you are going to walk slowly then that's fine but stay straight or look out over your head because you just might see my backside flying over your head some time soon.

I have also been wondering this week whether I am famous. I don't know if it's the way I look at people which makes them look back at me in a kind of inquisitive way, but loads of people have been looking at me very strangely recently. Like they know me. Like I have my tongue out. Like I have my penis poking out of my trousers. I check and I don't have anything poking out. So I think, am I paranoid? I've got another 30 years of commuting ahead of me so it's a bit early for the paranoia to set in. It's a concern and on some of my really grumpy days I have been worrying close to asking what they are staring at. I think my fear is that they will say "you've got a lump of toothpaste on your cheek" and then I would have to throw myself out of the window of the train.

I am now hooked on the FrankWit podcast. I don't really know why. Sometimes it's a bit American high school humour, almost Beavis and Butthead with lots of burping and bloke humour but I think what I really like is that they don't care if people like it and they aren't after anything in return. And when I say they don't care if people like it I don't mean those podcasts and radio shows which deliberately say risky things about taboo subjects and set out to offend and shock. Those broadcasts are trying extremely hard to impress people by their fake outlandishness and claiming not to care about anything. What the guys at FrankWit talk about a lot of the time is genuinely funny and interesting. Have a listen yourself at FrankWit.com. And I still can't quite get my head around a 30 year old bloke who has his mother regularly guest on his podcast and they openly discuss anal sex.

So updates have been scarce lately and so hits are down. I'm more narked about that than you. I mean, if you cared you may post a comment. Maybe you don't care. Maybe you can't write?

2006-03-30T15:09:00.000+01:00

I wonder how the Ricky Gervais podcast is doing since he started charging for it. I never thought I'd say it but I'm just bored with him. I saw that he was offering a free videocast on iTunes. Oh, Mr Generous, that'll be 2 and a half minutes of, let's all guess together, yes that's right, Ricky saying silly things to Karl and Karl playing the dumb straight man. Again. And again. And again. Change the record. What next, full lenght videocasts you pay for? Let's see.

Bought and sold a few bits on eBay recently. I've got a decent feedback on there and I'm no novice but if I was just starting up on eBay now, I doubt I'd stick around long. It seems to be full of scammers. On my last auction I must have had 6 emails from people offering to do deals outside of eBay (which means they were setting up to fleece me). It's a shame because I don't think eBay will ever be as good as it was.

I've updated my iTunes Registry if you're interested. See link over there >>

This hasn't been very amusing today. It's better than nothing though. Possibly.

2006-03-22T17:31:00.000Z

What is it with women who do their make-up on the train in the morning? I mean, isn't the whole point of make-up that you want to look better *before* going out? So does that mean that her fellow commuters simply don't matter? She doesn't care that *we* can see that zit on her nose but just so long as the MD of her office doesn't see it, that's ok? What an insult. And not only the fact we have to look at her pasty unmade face I also have to suffer 30 minutes of continuous digs in the ribs as she applies layer after layer of icing onto her ugly cake. How would she feel if I started to wash my underarms or had a shave? Not aroused I expect.

Things I have wanted to shout this week:

You won't fit in there you fat bastard, stand up.
No. You cannot walk the length of the train because if you take one step further, I will slice off your head with this letter opener.
No matter how much make-up you apply, you will still be incredibly ugly.

But I didn't shout them because I am British and sane.

2006-03-03T11:33:00.000Z

I'm starting to really go off my iPod.

I've always hated the whole fashion accessory side of it but I bit the bullet and bought one as it was the best player on the market at the time. I'm sure Apple have plans for the sort of enhancements I would like but they will probably release new iPods year after year bringing one enhancement at a time in. They're smart like that.

So what do I want?

Simple.

1. When I'm halfway through a Podcast, and then play some music and come back to it, why can't it remember where I was? Some sort of memory or bookmarking of them must be possible.

2. Make the font smaller so you can get more info on the screen. Screen space is wasted.

3. On the 'Now Playing' screen why only show the basic info? Why not show play count, genre, album info etc. Or at least have these as options. They're all held in iTunes so why not send them to the iPod?

4. Get more functionality on the iPod itself. Get a few hard buttons for volume, playlists, track info etc. I know the iPod is famed for it's simplicity but does it have to be the simplest kid in the class?

2006-03-01T13:36:00.000Z

Why are some people programmed to state the absolute obvious, regardless of what it is and what others might think? In particular, those who feel the uncontrollable urge to say exactly what they see regardless of anyone's feelings. Their brains just have not developed.

Prime example - you've got a spot. A big spot. Big enough to be considered a new facial feature such as a second nose, a third eye or a brick. You know it's there. Everyone you meet knows it's there, but the majority resist the childhood urge to point it out. The urge to shout "Hah Hah, you've got a spot! You've got a spot!" or "Ooh, that looks nasty"

Apart from one.

There's always one who makes it the first thing they say - like an outburst of Tourettes, like a knee shooting out after a hit with the doctor's hammer. What these annoying arseholes expect to gain from pointing this out I don't know. Maybe:

"Oh great. I had no idea - thanks so much for letting me know. Now I can just wipe it off can't I - now you've pointed it out? And I suppose, as you obviously considered long and hard before pointing it out, that if I did already know it was there, that you thought I would really appreciate you drawing attention to it. Its so great to have such observant colleagues. I love the fact we're talking about it and I love you"

What they are lucky they don't get is a straight up "fuck off".

What are these people like when they see a blind man, or someone in a wheelchair? Do they rush straight up to them and point out their misfortune - "Hey you! You can't see a thing - how did that happen? That must be a right pain" or "Hey you! Why can't you walk? Was it a car crash or what?"

2006-02-21T16:24:00.000Z

I've listened to all 12 of the Ricky Gervais Podcasts and have generally enjoyed them. Having said that, I think after about 6, they fell into a very easy routine of it being the 'let's make Karl Pilkington sound stupid and all laugh' show. I thought it was ironic when a Reuters article implied Karl was a 'character' and Gervais said he wasn't acting and that he really is like that. This is a man who held a senior position as a producer at XFM London. Hmm.

I used to listen to the XFM show and that was where the real gold was. The show wasn't based entirely around Karl, it was the thoughts of Ricky and Steve and sometimes we got Karl's twisted take on things. It was genuine, natural comedy. Karl has some great stories and tells them very well. And he is a bit odd.

And of course, now they are going to start charging for the Podcasts. I never begrudge anyone making money for their work but I don't see why they need to start charging for them when there are alternative ways of getting revenue for them. They have obviously make some money selling the advertisements for Channel 4 (which I doubt come cheap for a Podcast with over 250,000 subscribers). So why not just sell a bit more airtime to the advertisers?

I expect they will only be charging something like 50p a Podcast (I've checked now - it's £4.50 for all 6) but I won't be paying. If I felt the shows had more to offer then I would, but I can't see what will be different - how it will move forward. Ricky said something along the lines of 'imagine if we'd charged every subscriber £1' - maybe that will become a reality now but don't expect 250,000 anymore boys…

2006-02-14T08:59:00.000Z

EBay fascinates me. There are bargains to be had for sure (not so many as in the early days though) but some people are *such* suckers.

I was bidding for an SD card and was outbid. I had a quick check to see what that actual card could be bought for from a decent online retailer before upping my bid. From Dabs it was £29 + £3 postage. The SD card ended up selling on eBay for £34 + £6 postage. People just assume that eBay Power Sellers are giving you bargains when they often aren't. Or are people just lazy? Or stupid?

It wasn't hard to find the best price online - I just went to Froogle UK.

2006-02-07T14:44:00.000Z

Why do some people insist on always giving an opinion even though it is not based on any fact whatsoever. You know the type - when someone says they are pregnant, they instantly say "it's a girl". Well it might be. It might not. You don't know so why are you making these bold statements. You must be very clever. On what basis are you saying that? I don't mean the people that have a little fun guess, it's the people that say it in that annoying all-knowing way. And when people do this, no-one ever goes back to them and says "you were wrong, and you were, and you".

I guess it's the same for people who think they have seen ghosts. They haven't. I even had a conversation with someone who said they "have worked with ghosts". I bit my lip.

I was listening to Larry David recently and he used the term 'sociopath'. I've never heard that before but I related to it instantly. I think there is a bit of Larry in everyone, it's just some people suppress it more. I tend to say what I think and I can't abide lying. I don't even like white lies. This may be because I'm just a very bad liar. As I get a bit older, I'm trying to be less of a sociopath. This means I keep my mouth shut in many situations. Say, for example, someone is rattling on about religion. Depending in my mood, and my sociopathic tendencies, I may or may not enter the discussion. If I do, they will leave, offended.

No-one has bought the flat opposite yet. Until I go, I guess it will stay that way.

Took a long walk at lunchtime (even braved the Millennium Bridge). Enjoyed the sounds of Elliot Smith, Interpol and Nick Cave on my iPod. No. It didn't really cheer me up.

2006-02-02T08:53:00.000Z

From my office window I can see into some nice apartments. You'd think I'd see loads of exciting activity wouldn't you? Unfortunately not, as to afford places like those, you're at work for the majority of daylight hours. One of the apartments is for sale and for the last week I have been watching people view it. They all do the same. They get to the window, look out, look up and down the road, then across at me. At that very point they go off of the flat. I see it in their eyes. Their mind processes me. The window. Their privacy. Gone. They see some excitement starved office worker peering at them, with eyes that say 'do something. Anything'. It doesn't have to be taking your clothes off, although feel free. Just do the ironing. Or hoover. It'll break my day up.

But no. They think I'm some voyeuristic office pervert who will spoil the enjoyment of their £400,000 apartment and for some reason a droopy eyed geek on a laptop isn't very good for property sales. Oh well. Of course they could look at *me* - maybe *I* wouldn't like that. The lights have gone off over there now. Another "We'll have a think about it" when the agent won't hear from them again...

2006-01-31T09:08:00.000Z

On the train the other night the driver had a stammer. When I was 12 I would have found this funny. Now I am older, and quite probably wiser, I take a more sympathetic view. Call it softness in older age. He is often the driver who takes me home so I'm familiar with the difficulties he has in announcing the stations. Many drivers say hardly anything but he says everything; the safety announcements, tells us the doors are closing, lists the stations we're stopping at. He could probably avoid it but he doesn't.

In the set of seats in front of me was a lady who found this very amusing. She was in her forties. Her giggles and glances were enticing other commuters to snigger as he struggled to get some words out. I was extremely close to challenging her on this. The thing is, she was fat. She was very fat. In fact, as Eminem would say, I ain't never seen an ass like that. She wasn't born fat, as our driver was with his stammer. She has got fat through eating too much. So my point would have been this:

"Excuse me. Do you think that the driver thinks it is funny that you are that fat?. I mean, you think it's so funny that he has a stutter, maybe we should go and get him and see how funny he thinks your obesity is? And after all, he can't lose that stammer whereas if you laid off of the Sarah Lee's and Chinese take aways, I expect you could drop a few dress sizes. Maybe you would even be able to stop shopping in Camping and General for your dresses?"

But of course I didn't say that. I'm British. Too reserved for my own good. Bitch.

2006-01-25T21:13:00.000Z

I just love spam. I love spam from people who think that recipients are so stupid, they will do anything. Let me demonstrate:

To whom it may concern, [Ooh, that must mean me]

Let us inform you that MSJuice, Inc starts a new project in the UK
and is looking for a reliable [I am!], well-motivated [That too!] and well-executive [err. not sure what being "well-executive" means but I is it yeah?]
person to take care of the projectâ€™s needs. The job requires
a flexible schedule shift and doesnâ€™t require strictly
specialized skills. [perfect!]

According to this fact we are offering you a position [whoah! whoah! You're offering me a position? You didn't even address this letter to me in person. You don't know who I am.]
of the Executive Manager of MSJ, Inc. [Executive Manager - To Whom It May Concern! Excellent] If you are in searching of a secure managing job [I am in searching!], please response this message for more detailed description of the opportunity with your CV or Resume
attached to the message.

Please forward all your questions and comments to: info@mnsservice.com

With due respect, [and due respect back to you bro']

And then, the other day I get an email with the subject line: "Message from the Online Apple Store". Now if I'd recently ordered something from them, I'd read on.

So I read on and it explained that the order which I recently placed for a Sony Digital Camera has been processed. Woah! Woah! A SONY camera from Apple. How many brain deads would still email these people back? Worryingly, some.

2006-01-20T14:34:00.000Z

Apparently there is a whale swimming up and down the Thames at the moment.

Coincidentally, I was along the Embankment today and heard some joggers talking about it. I thought they were talking crap. But that may be due to my growing dislike for the Embankment Joggers. Thing with them is, they think someone having a lunchtime stroll should get out of the way for some sweaty iPod and Lycra clad office gimp, panting towards them flapping their arms around. You're the one running - You get out of my way. And by the way fellas (mostly fellas), most of you don't look as though the whole jogging thing is doing you any good at all.

I took a snap along the Embankment with my phone - I don't think I can see the whale though.

2006-01-20T11:21:00.000Z

I really liked the Donut Guys comparison between what Burger King advertised and what they actually sold. How many times have we all thought "that doesn't look anything like it does on that poster"?

It's not only cleverly staged / deliberately misleading food photography which is deceptive. Descriptions can be even more annoyingly flowery. The Marks and Spencer adverts which have been running for a while in the UK demonstrate this perfectly with their elaborately entitled food descriptions making them sound so much greater than they actually are. Along the lines of

"This isn't just salmon. This is free-range, Scottish kilt-wearing, organically grown, privately educated, great-in-bed salmon, drizzled with garlic and herb angel tears",

and

"This isn't just a chocolate tart. This is Outer Mongolian, devil-whipped, guaranteed aphrodisiac, wealth-and-improved-looks-inducing chocolate tart, served with hand-churned-by-Belgiun-eunuchs ivory-glazed cream".

You get the message. And whilst I really liked Hermione in Cold Feet, her voice is bloody annoying.

And why do I have to endure these descriptions written down on menus? The worst culprits are the American style diners here in England and pubs who insist on describing battered prawns for example as, "Succulently fried North Atlantic beer battered king prawns with a smoky Louisiana ranch dip". And our old friends McDonalds were giving away a free coffee with a coupon the other day which they described as a "freshly ground premium coffee". So, that'll be a coffee then? I'm surprised they didn't boast about the temperature they serve it at "...served at an optimum temperature equidistant between hot and cold, suitable for enjoying the full warmth of the premium beverage".

2006-01-13T17:46:00.000Z

I saw a piece on the TV recently about a bloke who had decided to live in some woods for a year. He's not a tramp. In fact, from the article it looked as though he worked for Sotheby's. He sleeps in the woods, goes to the gym first thing to get showered, goes out as usual at night, then goes back to the woods to sleep. Can't imagine he's getting much luck with the ladies, living in the woods and all that.

I find it hard enough setting off for my commute from the comfort of my own bed, let alone waking up in a freezing forest.

Follow his blog here - ODM Original Ditch Monkey

2006-01-10T21:24:00.000Z

How to ensure people stop reading my blog: update infrequently.

So, back on the trains and the streets of London. A particularly joyous time this week as there was another Tube strike (and yes, Tube drivers, we all know why you also chose New Years Eve to strike, and it wasn't to cause disruption - enjoy your parties?). So this Monday we had the streets full of amateur walkers zig-zagging across pavements, sweating at the mere thought of walking more than 100 metres and generally clogging up the streets. No fun for anyone. Thankfully I only had to survive it for a day as the streets were back to normal today.

Trains are packed now everyone is back to work and already I'm hating people - girl sits next to me tonight in her big fluffy coat. After a few minutes she gets up and opens the window. Take your coat off you selfish cow! After about 10 minutes a very quick train flew by in the opposite direction and sucked the window shut. I like to think I did it with my mind.

Bit random but - words and phrases I hate:

"All the trimmings" - Don't try to use this festive catch-all. Say what we get so we can tell what you've skimped on,
"Mopping up" - People who use this phrase in relation to the eating of anything should stop,
"Lashings of..." - See above. Don't say it. We aren't in a Dickens novel,
"Contemporary" - You mean modern don't you? Why use 5 syllables when you can use 2?
"Modern contemporary" - They mean the same thing. Why use 7 syllables when you can use 2?

Remind me I want to talk about Banksy soon if I forget.

Back soon.

2006-01-06T19:47:00.000Z

You've been worrying haven't you? Did he commit suicide over stuffing balls and over-cooked turkey? He didn't.

I'll be back in force when I decide to start hitting the keyboard in 2006. To be honest, it's been a struggle to get going this year.

Back in a couple of days...

2005-12-24T17:41:00.000Z

I just noticed they wiped the iTunes Registry database which blanked my account. Noone has been able to see what I'm listening to (link on the right). Hopefully my currently in progress upload will fix that and the world can start turning again.

No grumpiness today because it's Christmas eve. Have a good time. Just try.

2005-12-21T13:57:00.000Z

At this time of year I just love commuting. Naturally I am being hilariously sarcastic.

The first thing which I just love on my walk towards the platform at my local station and on the streets of London at the other end, is the small parcels of vomit from the night before. This morning I passed four such deposits. It's the car crash mentality that means you simply must not only look at them but also inhale through your nose taking a deep waft of the disgusting, 10 hour deposit. Each bomb tells a story. The red one with no substance tells the passer by that this person had a big night - they skipped dinner and got straight on the Bloody Mary's. Suicide. I often expect to find that actual person, face down in a hedge as I continue down the street. Then there is the vomit series. You see a small pat on the floor and put it down to slight over-indulgence. Then a few yards along there is another one, this one being more pronounced, heavier, meatier. Then the third which looks like someone was disembowelled on that very spot the night before. It's got more colours than a Dulux chart and more lumps than a Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall soup. It's a great start to the day taking it all in.

The second joy of commuting over the festive season is the office parties. At lunch times, these hoards of suited droids all head out for their Christmas dinner, taking up entire pavements as they each struggle to say the wittiest thing ever to gain that valuable office kudos. These can be tolerated as I just don't go out for lunch - I just watch their rosy red faces walk past my office window after too many glasses of over-priced red wine. My main problem is with the office groups out in the evenings. Now, the fact that they are taking up the entire pavement is a problem. They are in my way. I'm going home. Countless men pacing up and down outside pubs on their mobile phones just getting in my way. Getting to the station from the office is like half an hour on Takeshi's Castle except without the fun.

Not much longer though as when the week ends so does my time in the office for the year. Screw commuting for a little while. I won't be missing it.

2005-12-16T09:23:00.000Z

Christmas is bad, but the office Christmas party is truly my low-point of the year. I manage to avoid most work related soiree's throughout the year but you cannot hide from nor deny the prosthetic fun-time that is the office Christmas party (aka You Will Have Fun). I enjoy a night out like many people. In fact I go out quite often - gigs, meals, the pub (Oh yeah, 'he's one crazy horse' you're thinking). What I can't stand is false fun. Contrived fun. Being told that because it's Christmas you WILL have fun. I can't do it. I hate smalltalk. I don't care what Mary from Accounts is doing for Christmas. In fact, I couldn't care less. I don't want to talk to that personality exempt tortoise from IT. Ever. So why do we have to do this? Why must I suffer the office Christmas party? Get me away from these people. Isn't it logical that if I wanted to spend time with these people, then I would do so more than once a year? Can't anyone else see that?

At the event itself, I am always torn between two approaches. The first approach is to get really into it, have a load of beers and get everyone laughing. The danger of this is that one inappropriate remark, one joke-which-seemed-funny-at-the-time-after-5-pints, goes and offends someone. Someone important. Or someone sensitive. By the next day, it's been exaggerated by a factor of 10 and because you had a few, you don't know what actually happened. I don't want that. The other approach is to be reserved and mingle with the more reserved people. This is far less dangerous in a career way, but does run the risk of my work peers thinking I am a brown-nosing bore. I don't want that either. So where do I go? Mid-point of course. This makes for the most uncomfortable night of the year trying to steer myself in and out of situations.

The party is often hyped up by people who have their entire collection of friends made up by work colleagues. I find this scary. Who did they go out with when they didn't work here? Why aren't they still in touch? Do they just latch on to colleagues and leave them when they leave? Like having an extended colleague - not just for the office but for outside too. What does it say about their popularity that they haven't retained any friends from their last job? Hmm. But they will be at the office party. Being the life and soul although ironically, having either couldn't be further from the reality.

2005-12-14T13:48:00.000Z

I suffering with excessive exposure to people again. I think I should have my own office. And my own train.

Please. Please. Please don't sit in front of your computer at lunchtime laughing. Laughing constantly. Laughing louder and louder. Noone cares what you are laughing at so please, spare sharing with us your joy. And it isn't funny anyway. Even though I don't know what it is, I know it won't be funny. It will be some wacky flash animation which swears a lot which makes simple people laugh. Yes, that's you. Or it will be some MPEG of a crazy schoolkid who has written a hilarious song about something. Which will involve swearing which makes simple people laugh. Yes, that's you. Don't get me wrong. Some of the web stuff is good. But let's face facts, 90% of it is shit. The Bike Riding Donut guy (link over to the right) usually puts a useful list together in his blog so you could do worse than follow his selections.

Please. Please. Please don't hoover up your food right in front of me at your desk. That might be a tasty jacket potato with some processed hot crap over it but I don't need to you announce that you are eating it by making super slurping noises every time you take a bite as if you are actually inhaling the food. Eat quietly. Most manage it. Be human If a piece of food drops from your fork, let it go. Let it drop back onto your potato feast and pick it up again. You don't need to chase it with your wide open fish mouth like some staving carp trying to suck it in before it drops.

Please. Please. Please don't open the window when you get on the train. You may be overweight. You may have got up late because you spent and extra half hour in bed masturbating over the sexy one on the BBC Breakfast programme, but I didn't. Neither did any of my fellow passengers. So when you join my train, running at 40 miles per hour, soaking wet like you've been down a coal mine all day followed by a session at the gym, it's hardly fair that you slob on and open the window because you are hot. I have seen people get up straight away and close the window after Mr. Slobby has done that and it's great. They are sometime apologetic (ie. insensitive and self unaware) or they kick off. It's best when they kick off.

2005-12-12T20:29:00.000Z

I know. It's a lame, almost cliched excuse, but I have been mad-busy. I often found people, particularly at my last job, who used to constantly tell everyone how busy they were, very grating. If you are busy, people will see that. You don't need to go round explaining how you are doing more for your wage packet than anyone else. They tended to be the same people who hit the keys on their keyboards too hard as well. As if to announce, via the drum machine that it their QWERTY keyboard, that they are having a hard session of work. Like anyone else cares.

Now I have used the phrase, 'hard session' (bugger, there it is again) my blog will be plagued with internet pervs looking for something I can't offer. One of my recent referrals came from the phrase 'trouser bulge'. Who googles *that*? Maybe it's a woman. Yeah. Let's say it's a woman and not some highly strung homosexual who liked the sound of a commuter's trouser bulge. Woah.

And I was planning to talk about Christmas. Back soon.

2005-12-02T14:40:00.000Z

Questions for today:

When people are walking along the pavement and they come to a road, why do they always walk slightly up the adjoining road before crossing? People never just carry on straight. They always have to curve their walk. Dopes.

Why do you feel like you need to go to the toilet when you are in an enclosed space?

Why do I always say to myself that I will not drink so much at the weekends and then the next weekend I drink so much?

Why are Blackberry users such tossers? (I was walking in the rows of cattle yesterday along the station platform and it seemed unnecessarily slow. After a few minutes, like getting to the front of a queue of traffic to find a tractor towing bails of hay, was an office gimp hunched over his Blackberry frantically thumbing for soulless communication. Problem with human traffic is that you don't have your safety shell - your car. You can't blow your horn (although I have often pondered such an invention, that and human wing/arm mirrors) you can't curse without anyone hearing, you have to either say something or nothing. Or just give them a nudge as you walk by. Guess what I did?)

Blackberrys: The devil's creation

2005-11-21T15:25:00.000Z

Has the world completely lost it's manners? On the train were two friends. One was obviously visiting london and had spent the day shopping while the other was at work and then they had met up on the train. The office one asked how the tourists day had been and then immediately pulled out her Blackberry and started dementedly thumbing away at it. Slightly suprised, the tourists tales of the day slowed as she realised her so-called friend now found a small box with a keyboard on it more interesting, only for the office ignoramus to tell her to carry on as "it had gone back to september" so she'd be "scrolling for ages".

How important is checking your email on a Friday night when you left the office half an hour ago? Clearly more important than worrying about offending your friends through your grotesque rudeness or showing the whole train that you are either a tragic workaholic or a spineless corporate slave.

The same thing happens with text messages. You'll be having a conversation with someone, they get a text, then they've gone. Head down, thumbing into thier box of news to see who the urgent directive is from. Most of the time it will be of the level of importance of "What U UP2 2nite?". Still, it always seems more important than finishing the conversation. You don't think it's just me do you? Are you listening?

2005-11-17T13:43:00.000Z

I must say that lately, commuting has not been the usual jousting festival I have come to despise over the years. In fact, apart from the odd fat-legged bloke, and overly chatty Bird-on-Mobile, it has been ok. Just to keep me on my toes today however, the Man in The Sky who controls the arrival of trains from the suburbs into one of London's busiest maninline stations, decided to make every train arrive at the same time this morning. It was amazing. Like the end of a football match or concert except people were going in different directions, like ants having their territory splashed by hot kettle of water.

I immediately noticed a man who could clearly not handle this type of bussle. His way of dealing with it was to walk like a wildebeest through the crowds without changing direction or altering his pace. This obviously resulted in him barging a lot of people. Arsehole, I thought. The thing with taking this approach is that, as everyone is moving so fast and in a hurry to get to work, noone is going to stop him to ask him to mind his manners. I doubt he does it in his local post office on a Saturday morning.

Anyway, the idiot didn't pass by me so I escaped a shove. No sooner had Moronic Wildebeest One passed, Moronic Wildebeest Two arrived and he was one person in front of me. Same species, but this was with his female which will tend to mean the barges are firmer because he is 'looking hard' in front of her. Whack. He barges the bloke in front of me.

I had no time to react and luckily I didn't need to. I was already fixing my headphones into my ear so my right arm was bent, shoving my Sony into my right ear. All that was required was a little firming of the arm muscles and whack, he barges me. Problem for him was that his unnecessarily hefty 'I'm a big hard man' barge was all channelled back into his own upper arm by the hard end of by elbow. That had to hurt. In fact, I expect it bruised. It's a good job I wasn't fixing my left headphone in as he would probably have a broken jaw. Tosser.

2005-11-07T19:57:00.000Z

It's not good enough is it? Just buggering off without so much as a word. Well I had some pressing matters to attend to taking me away from the comforting time waster that is talking to IP addresses on the internet. Don't worry, my distraction was hideously dull.

So what have I missed moaning about? Firework night. Here in the UK I fear we are taking November the 5th the same way we seem to have embraced Christmas over recent years. Completely over the top. I don't mean the commercialisation - that's always been there - I mean the way we decorate the *outside* of our houses like budget grottos. We do the same on Bonfire Night. Everyone knows someone who can get 'display fireworks' that are 'absolutely mental' so we spend Â£20 on a rocket that could shoot a light aircraft out of the sky. As with the battle for the biggest inflatable Santa-down-the-chimney at Christmas, neighbours battle against each other like warring nations detonating their scud missiles into the night sky, frightening the very children to death who they were alledgedly bought for.

And as I sit and type on the 7th November, it still sounds like Iraq outside. When will it end? Not till the new year now.

You've missed me right?

2005-10-30T09:33:00.000Z

Apple are a clever lot aren't they? People talk about computer manufacturers building in obsolescence to their PCs but Apple are just the worst.

They bring out a wide range of iPods which sell well. They launch an expensive colour screen iPod which doesn't sell well because you could buy a basic Dell PC for the same price and still have change for a holiday. So they reduce the price of the colour ones and simplify the range. All good.

Then they really push the iPod Mini and sell millions of them.

Right kids.

All got an iPod now?

Apple launch the shuffle. Not quite a competitor to the mini because it's got a smaller capacity, no screen and er..it's not very good. People still buy them though.
And while all this is going on, Steve Jobs says video is not the way forward for the iPod. He says this often.

They release the Nano. Where did *that* technology come from? You kept that quiet Apple didn't you? Thin, light, colour screen. Just how many kids binned their Mini's instantly? What do you do when everyone has what you are selling? Make it better and they'll buy it again.

Then they decide video *is* the way forward (Steve Jobs must have been joking or something) and launch the new 5g iPods which play videos. Why the change of "mind"?

What I dislike is the carefully managed release strategy of these products. People probably don't buy shuffles now the Nano is here, so it was a pointless product with a shelf like of 6 months so why release it? Easy money I suppose.

The iPod is a good product but I get sick of Apple keep trickling their new technology out in such a blatantly commercial way. And while I'm at it, didn't Eminem take Apple to court for using his track on their iPod advert? Now they're advertising his new album with iTunes. What's up Eminem, did you make up?

2005-10-19T13:49:00.000+01:00

Working in an open plan office I restrain myself from:

1. In reaction to the constant trotting around the office, one day I will climb onto my desk and order, at the top of my voice that "EVERYONE SITS BACK DOWN AND DOES SOME FUCKING WORK". I will thank them quietly and continue with my own work. If challenged by anyone (and there is always one) I will be in a position to recite a minute-by-minute log of that persons movements over the last fortnight thus embarrassing them into admission that they spend too much time in the kitchen/at the water cooler/in the toilet/popping to the shop/back at the water cooler/reading the notice board/back at the water cooler/perching on someone desk boring the life out of them with tales of their weekends diving lesson...

2. Finding that mobile phone which keeps ringing the most annoying inane tone ever heard by man, and throwing it at the bare brick wall so it smashes into silence into a million pieces. Then, collecting every little fragment of their 15 year old Nokia in a dustpan and placing it in a neat pile back where I found it on their desk. Accompanying the remnants would be a post-it note which says "If only you had put it on silent. Wanker".

3. In reaction to the person who cannot keep their voice below a holler as soon as they go on the phone, I wish to stroll up to them whilst they are in mid-shout-conversation, crouch down to their now confused face, touch noses with them, putting my finger over my mouth and blow them a spit-shooting "SHHHHHHHHHHH!".

4. Tell the girl who sits nearby, that the outfits she wears are way too distracting for an office. I need to explain exactly what I am thinking when she reaches up to get her book from the top of the cupboard every morning and enlighten her on the power she has over the entire male population of the office to which she seems entirely oblivious.

2005-10-18T14:02:00.000+01:00

I think about alcohol a lot. Not always in the sense that I want to drink it. I've been thinking recently about how much a good night out is down to what you did and where you went and who you were with, and how much of it is down to how much you drank. Would that night have been as funny, entertaining and enjoyable if you were drinking water? Would the night have been rubbish? Take loud club/pubs, they are purely designed for drinking. There is nothing to do apart from drink, dance and go to the toilet so that's want we do and we consider it a good night once we've done it. Take any one of those away and you will either be bored or busting for a piss.

So next time I go out, I'm going to do a drink test first - consider whether I could enjoy this night without getting drunk. Without feeling like someone have shoved a giant sponge up my arse and sucked every ounce of fluid from my entire body and then yanked the sponge out of me like a wanker at a dinner party proving that he can remove the table cloth without breaking any plates. We find ourselves on autopilot when it comes to drinking, it's synonymous with a night out but it really shouldn't be.

My worst mistake is drinking at gigs. I have often woken up the next morning and can barely remember the performance since I was more intent on getting as much overpriced Carling down my neck as possible and then sideways marching through the crowd with my breath held to keep going to the toilet. And paid £50 for the ticket.

In other news, I have been getting an excellent seat on the train lately. It makes my day not having to share body heat with anyone after I have got out of bed until I get back into bed that night.

2005-10-13T17:03:00.000+01:00

James Blunt. Shepherd's Bush. London. October 2005.

The man has no idea how to create a setlist.
The lights dim, the crowd cheers, the man appears.
The man then opens with a track no one has ever heard before.
The crowd stand like statues for 4 minutes trying to get into this new track thinking "did I miss this from the album?".
He goes off and returns for the encore.
He opens the encore with a track no one has ever heard before.
Work the crowd man! Open with You're Beautiful, that's what everyone has come to hear and then get on with your set. And that bit half way through the set when you walked to the edge of the stage in between songs and stood there waving at the crowd like some star-struck roadie was just embarrassing. James Blunt, you let the side down. But not as much as your fans...

When I go to a gig I want to hear the artist sing, not 750 morons singing in unison, drowning out the act. If you want to sing, stay home and put the album on - you are at a gig not a fucking karaoke night. Yeah, yeah, it's me, they were having fun but it shouldn't be at the expense of the performance. James Blunt has a talent but his target market lets the whole thing down. He's pop. His fans love pop. I don't. I misjudged things. We have now separated. I'll still listen to the album if I can be sure those singing, pointing, geek-muppets won't accompany every note.