// The World we Live In
No Offense, But…
It seems that BBC Radio 1 has edited the only truly realistic Christmas song “the Fairy Tale of New York” to remove the term “faggot” just in case people are offended by it.
Now much as I don’t want to become one of those Daily Mail “it’s political correctness gone mad” types, I can’t help but feel it’s a bit ridiculous in this case.
(And in any case, surely terms of abuse are supposed to be offensive? If they weren’t there wouldn’t be much point in them would there?)
Posted on December 18, 2007 | Filed Under The World we Live In | 0 Comments
Validation at last!
The Evening Standard have reviewed my mate Rob’s pub The Vauxhall Griffin rather positively (and rightly so, it’s rather fine).
But I’m particularly gratified by the fact that the quiz he and I run there got a mention.
Admittedly it was a one-word description, but as far as adjectives go I think “lively” isn’t a bad one at all.
Posted on November 25, 2007 | Filed Under My So-Called Life, The World we Live In | 0 Comments
A Conversation Overheard On the Train…
So, I popped down to Canterbury last weekend to help my Dad celebrate his 61st birthday – or, as he put it, the fortieth anniversary of his 21st birthday – and thus the early hours of Saturday morning saw me on a train bound from Victoria with a bunch of other Kent-bound individuals.
It was a dull journey, it always is. Well… actually, I say dull. Travel is generally not a favourite pastime, but of a bright autumn morning the scenery rushing past was quite pretty I suppose. And there wasn’t much in the way of pretty males to ogle en route so I was content with that.
But at Gillingham (a town not known for its classiness) a young couple boarded the train and sat in one of the seats diagonally opposite me. She was in leggings, needless to say, and he was extremely casually dressed, but quite cute in a sort of “could do with a decent skincare regime” sort of a way. Together though it must be said there was certainly a certain kind of crack-addict chic about them.
They were chatting. I was plugged into The Device so wasn’t aware of their conversation until we passed Selling and began to approach Canterbury. I duly unplugged myself and began gathering my things together. Idly, as one does, listening in to what’s going on around me in case there was anything interesting to be had.
Oh boy.
At first, you see, I thought they were talking about their jobs. There definitely was that sort of “and Janice in accounts said this, can you believe it?” sort of vibe to the conversation. And they were talking about money, particularly how she’d been given a hard time over it and how, or so I thought, she’d finally been made an offer which she’d thought was unacceptable and she’d had to think about it for a bit.
It was only as the train pulled into the station that one final fact suddenly changed the whole nature of their conversation as it finally became clear to me that what they’d been planning to offer her hadn’t actually been a payrise at all.
It was a custodial sentence.
The home counties really aren’t what they used to be, you know…
Posted on November 8, 2007 | Filed Under The World we Live In | 0 Comments
Don’t Lose Our Heads…
Was watching the classic “Carry On Don’t Lose Your Head” last night with an – ahem – gentleman caller, when part of the script caught my attention.
Robespierre: So – it seems the English have struck again!
Camembert: Well, they say that’s what the English are good at: striking!
(Or something along those lines.)
It just struck me that something which was probably quite a solid piece of satire for its time seems to have become rather more apposite again. What with Tube Strikes, Postal Strikes and now BBC staff threatening to do the same there was a certain resonance to those lines I hadn’t felt before.
I’ll nail my colours to the mast here: I don’t like strikes. It’s essentially emotional blackmail and does strike me as being remarkably counter-productive. In the case of BBC staff, there’s a ?Ǭ£2billion pound shortfall of revenue – do they really think that forcing the BBC not to make redundancies will help? And in the case of the postal workers it does seem largely to be a “we’ve been getting away with all sorts of dodgy or just extremely lucrative practices for years and you’re trying to clamp down – how dare you” type thing.
In both cases you have companies struggling to adapt to a changing world of work where greater flexibility and leaner processes are the only way to stop them going under. I can’t see how striking and essentially making your employer cripple itself is a victory for anyone, because at some point they’ll just go under sure as night follows day (and vice versa).
Not that I think in either case some savings couldn’t be found elsewhere, but at some point people would have to go and inconveniencing the many for the benefit of the few is something that in this day and age the general public seems to find less sympathy for than it would have done in the sixties.
But there we are. As ever, time will tell. It always does.
Posted on October 19, 2007 | Filed Under The World we Live In | 3 Comments
Not So Liberal After All..?
So Sir Menzies Campbell has been forced out of office following a fairly high profile whispering campaign (well, shouting campaign really) against him which has left me with a rather bad taste in my mouth regarding my preferred – out of a bad bunch – party.
What’s worse is that the image it projected was not only harking back to Conservative leadership battles which let’s be honest left that party somewhat crippled for ages (“I’m Not Going!”, “I’m Not Going!”, “You’re Going!”, “I’m Going!”) but, as it turns out, the two front-runners for succeeding him remind me – at least in terms of look – of Conservative MPs.
It’s something about the city financier look. It makes me want to slap them and tax their bonuses to high fuck.
Plus there’s that age old phrase in the Indie today. “Mr. Clegg is married with a wife and two children.” And frankly that sort of comment is the sort of thing I’d expect of a Tory leadership bid: “Look, he’s happily heterosexual with a family and that’s what’s important, right?”
Oh well, we shall see. My confidence is shaken somewhat, though.
I may have to go Green.
Posted on October 16, 2007 | Filed Under The World we Live In | 3 Comments
Stop It At Once!
Apologies to anyone I know who recognises themselves in this but, well… tough!
I like books. I like reading. I like being able to do so when I’m on the move. I read yesterday on the train back from Manchester, I read most days when I’m on the tube, and I know many people like to do the same.
This is, without a shadow of a doubt, a good thing.
But please, fellow travellers, humans, countrymen… would you please for fuck’s sake STOP when you switch to walking?
There are few things more irritating than trying to navigate round some complete prick who has their nose buried in a book or newspaper, with them somehow managing to remain completely oblivious to the world around them and thus weaving erratically through the crowds.
Pay some fucking attention to the world around you, please – if only for your own safety! Because one day someone may just try dropping a banana skin in front of you to see what, if anything, happens.
Not me, though, obviously.
(I can pay people to do it instead.)
Posted on October 8, 2007 | Filed Under My So-Called Life, The World we Live In | 1 Comment
Of Jerks and Butts
As I take the bus to Liverpool Street Station each morning, I do tend to mentally flatline I will admit. Sitting there with the latest recently-released BWO and Dragonette albums playing whilst I think of pretty much nothing is, as far as I’m concerned, one of the most sacred parts of the day.
However, there are two names that tend to spark some level of awareness as we motor recklessly past them which – if truth be told – make me smile no matter how many times I see them.
The lesser enjoyment is the mere existence of a place en-route called “Newington Butts”. Sadly the reason for the name is less amusing than the name itself, but there we are. I smirk, therefore I am.
The other – and to my mind far superior – diversion is a little earlier on the Brixton Road towards Oval. At first glance it appears to be nothing more than a small shop, part of a row of non-de-script frontages which can be found in any of the more urban London areas. But the name screams out to my admittedly puerile mind and has brightened up my day on several occasions.
It’s called the “Reggae Jerk Centre” and, frankly, the first time I saw it my mind boggled.
Naturally I have so far come up with three possible uses for the said centre and they are, to be fair, far more interesting to my mind than the truth.
But the imagination is always more interesting isn’t it?
Posted on September 28, 2007 | Filed Under My So-Called Life, The World we Live In | 1 Comment
Journey of the Damned
There are, I fear, few more pitiful sights than that of the commuter whose routine has been disrupted.
But since Bob Crow ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú arsehole in chief of the RMT – has called his members out on strike, the streets are once again full of confused stumbling zombies, their brains having shut down and their patience chips temporarily suspended. Liverpool Street Station this morning was swarming with armies of mentally-flatlining individuals who, in at least one part of the station, were taking solace in an attempt to create the worlds biggest queue.
When in doubt, form a line. It?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s a terribly British response.
I am somewhat irked by all of this I must say. The militancy of Crow and his cronies always exasperates me since he comes across as a bullish, uncompromising and arrogant individual, drunk on the power that calling a strike regularly gives him. And in a television interview last night I really wanted someone to slap him one since, in my opinion, anyone who says ?¢‚Ǩ?ìthe reality is?¢‚Ǩ¬ù as many times as he did probably has a very shaky hold on what they?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢re trying to define.
No, Bob, the reality is that what you?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢re calling for is unreasonable. It?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s one thing for the current administrators to guarantee that they will continue to honour jobs and pensions during their administration ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú and quite right that is too ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú but to assert that they can demand the future purchasers (whoever they may be) do the same is utter nonsense.
Clearly no purchaser is going to want to take on a very publicly failed company without making changes, so if the administrators put such conditions in place you?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢d be bloody lucky to get any interest at all ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú which screws over both the tube network and also the Union members whose interests the RMT is pledged to protect.
But there we are, reason is a foreign country and so the commuters must be subjected to a cruel and unusual punishment indeed.
That said, my journey in today was relatively smooth. Admittedly it fell apart a little at the end when the driver of the 133 didn?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t realise that due to a road closure there was a diversion, but hey. Somehow he missed all the huge signs indicating this and ended up having to do a three point turn where South Place and Eldon Road meet (confusing the hell out of a hundred or so zombies), before heading back along Moorgate, the London Wall and back up to Liverpool Street Station.
The only irritating thing was that having made the mistake and deciding to correct it he wouldn?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t let anyone off despite the fact that we were all pretty much where we wanted to be.
I sometimes wonder if Bus Drivers go on ?¢‚Ǩ?ìBloody Mindedness 101?¢‚Ǩ¬ù training before starting their jobs.
Posted on September 4, 2007 | Filed Under My So-Called Life, The World we Live In | 3 Comments
File under: Self-Awareness (Lack Of)
Much has been made in the news about Billie Piper’s distressing episode of blindness the other night, which it is thought was finally triggered by the flashbulbs used by the paparazzi.
Apparently there’s a suggestion that the problem may have started during a shoot earlier with celeb-snapper Rankin, but it was later as the other bulbs were going off that the problems really started, culminating in Piper being unable to open her eyes on Friday morning.
Which means that the Sun’s decision to run the story alongside ‘razi pictures of her distressed and weeping on the as she started suffering problems is at best a bit of an own-goal. Still, what did you expect from The Sun, eh? A sense of personal responsibility and self awareness? Nah.
Still, Billie’s going to be alright. Which is very good news indeed.
On a less positive note: Victoria Newton’s Bizarre – a grubby little column where the title is probably the only consistently accurate item – is still going strong.
Posted on August 11, 2007 | Filed Under Film, TV, Theatre, The World we Live In | 0 Comments
A Shellsuit and Bling
It’s just not a good look is it?
However, I had the “pleasure” of sharing a bus journey earlier with a gentleman who for some unknowable reason thought it was. The black and purple shellsuit (0% organic content) was bad enough I felt, but the adornment of chains and sovereign rings seemed a little incongruous on top of this sartorial misfire.
Unfortunately it also appeared he also splashed himself with an aftershave amongst whose principal ingredients were sweat, urine and embrocation.
I’m not going to miss that particular bus-route I must say.
Posted on June 29, 2007 | Filed Under My So-Called Life, The World we Live In | 3 Comments