graffiti

some more urban art for you.

this is just off brick lane (and for anyone traveling to new york why not try out their own brick lane curry house , and what a good excuse for me to go back there...) the graffiti here is on the walls of sclater street. during the week there is a hand car wash at work here. on sundays it is a street market selling any old bric a brac that people can find.
i did spend a saturday afternoon there taking some pictures of some amazing girls doing some amazing break dance style stuff.

the building is an old pub, that is being converted into flats. back in the day my mum and dad drank there, when they got tired of the pub they ran (which has been converted into flats). to the left of the building is bethnal green road, to the right is sclater street. both take you towards brick lane.

irony

****** i started this at the weekend, got sidetracked (well fell asleep, because i started to write it far too late), but thought i would finish it off, it has to be said a little of the rant force i did have for this has dissipated. oh well ****

you have to admire michael o’leary and ryanair, they have been part of the reason why air travel has been democratized allowing everyone the opportunity to see the world. in the 20 years of its existence it has gone from 5000 passengers to close on 30 million passengers a year.
they also have a fierce reputation for not caring too much about customer care, and being less than speedy in paying compensation to passengers who have suffered at the hands of the airline. which is fair enough, you are getting a no frills service that when it works provides the traveller a cheap flight allowing them to enjoy more on their holiday.

but it does seem a bit rich that a company that guards against paying compensation is one of the first to rush to demand that the government pay compensation to them.

and why does it want to sue the government?
because of what it sees as being a farcical handling of the recent foiled, alleged, terrorist plan to blow up 10 planes in mid-flight.
this lead to rather tight security at airports and this lead to delays.

now let’s, for the sake of argument, lay to one side the reasons why planes operating out of britain are potential targets. let’s also lay to one side the conspiracy stories that this "foiled plot" was no more than tony blair spin to take the pressure off of his ailing premiership.
lets for the sake of argument say it was a legitimate threat that the security forces scuppered, but thought that there might be a chance of a further threat.

so gentle reader do you say "hey ho lets go, lets fly the skies regardless of the possibility that we might end as a big blazing ball of fire?" or do you say "mmm we had better make sure that it is safe to fly and that no rascally passenger is trying to smuggle some explosives on board the plane?"

it seems if you are michael o’leary you continue your company policy of not really caring for the passenger and you want to fly regardless.

it does appear that baa plc (apparently it doesn't mean british airports authority but is actually what the company is called "baa", smart move...) was not adequately prepared for such an emergency. but lets be honest here - who would be?
(mind you the baa site does say this "provide a healthy and safe working environment by giving safety and security the highest priority at all times. we will systematically assess and manage our risks through audited best practice management systems." ooops)
perhaps the crack down went on longer than it should have done, though i suspect everyone would rather be safe than sorry.

now both ryanair and baa are private companies (according to wikipedia baa had a market capitalisation of £6.6 billion in 2005, while ryanair has net profits in the 200 million euro plus region). but for ryanair it is the government’s responsibility to oversee and pay for security, even though they would be among the first to cry foul if the government stepped in and tried to regulate the industry.
an argument could be made that as the state raises taxes for this reason they should step in and foot the bills, but we all know that corporations will go out of their way not to pay as much tax as they should. so maybe, as it is for you and me dear reader when it comes to protecting our houses, it should be the full responsibility of the airports and the airlines to make sure that their passengers are safe and secure.

as i said at the start you have to admire ryanair - they want all the profit, none of the responsibility. they want the government to protect them, but they do not want the government involved in how the industry works.
additionally we all know that if a terrorist attack is successful the finger of blame from companies such as ryanair will be pointed at the government for not er... doing enough.

sadly it is a response so typical of business.

demoted

pluto is no longer a planet, it has been demoted to being a dwarf planet.
for one reason it is because its orbit cuts across mecurys orbit. the other reason is that it is not just big enough.
it is now a prototype of a new class of astronoical object class.
so not quite a demotion more a move sideways then...

yet more proof, if we need it, that size matters.

suffering

you have suffered at the hands of the south african state; you end up spending 27 years in prison for your part in trying to bring down the apartheid regime. you even end up married to a woman who probably comes closest to destroying your reputation. none of this matters as you are nelson mandela, and you got to be the first democratically elected president of south africa. not only that but you got to do it while wearing your favourite batik style shirts.
while president you manage to reintegrate south africa into the community of nations. you manage to oversee a successful transition from apartheid to majority rule. even when you retire from the presidency you are man enough to admit you could have done more about hiv/aids in south africa.
although you have retired you still manage to attack as an international statesman, helping smooth over the differences between libya and the west. you speak out for peace, you speak out for africa and you speak out about hiv/aids.
you are probably one of the few people in the world who is both recognisable and respected. you have been honoured by all and sundry.
you are nelson mandela.
true this amount of reverence costs people such as bono will be quick to visit you in order to get credibility for themselves.

but what has nelson done to deserve a visit it from david “hoodie” cameron? obviously this is david’s attempt to usurp some of the international statesman role that tony blair does so well.
cameron is there to discuss the challenges that face africa, this being a “key part of modern conservatism”, though you have to wonder why as they care about the poor in africa as they surely don’t care about the poor in the uk.
he also pointed out that mandela’s "insights into the challenges facing south africa, the continent of africa and the wider world" were "hugely valuable".
perhaps being in the company of one of the most respected statesman of the modern age has forced cameron into spitting out platitudes and soundbites that say nothing meaningful or new, though this is probably a result of not having much to say but a desire to be seen next to a great man.
however if this is the first step in cameron’s plans to make the tories a less parochial party and one that welcomes the diversity of the world then perhaps it is a very canny move on the conservative leader’s part. by engaging with african and african issues the conservatives can appeal to the young and trendy who want to help africa (just think of the votes you can get from the live8 crowds) and of course in this act of diplomacy you signal that you are moving beyond the previous tendency to remain aloof from the world and move beyond the interests that have crippled them over europe.
the question is does david cameron need to do this? more and more there is a distinct chance that the voters will say goodbye to new labour and give the tories a chance to see if they can do it better. so if you do not follow through with these concerns you run the risk of quickly losing those new voters.
as blair returns from his holidays he is facing more and more pressure from his own party to move on, all of which plays into the tories hands.
will a meeting with nelson mandela elevate cameron in the eyes of the country? i would like to think, as the track record of the tories is that they really don’t care for anyone other than themselves. but in a world obsessed with style over content i think cameron has scored a serious point.

as for nelson mandela i think he has suffered enough and he should never have to meet a tory mp again!å

politics

politics comes in many forms there are the questions of relationships between nations: the making and maintaining of treaties and accords. how does the state relate to its citizens? does it encourage individualism or collectivism, does it allow freedoms or is it authoritarian. does the state seek and maintain peace or is it imperialistic. for some this is the most important form of politics as it is a matter of life and death for us all.
well they are wrong.

then there is gender politics, sometimes seen as being the battle of the sexes, but it is a bit more than that. gender politics covers more than just equality of the sexes, it looks at how women are represented in the media, how we are socialised into accepting certain sexual stereotypes and how these stereotypes continue. it is about definitions of beauty, definitions of what is acceptable behaviour from each of the sexes. it covers work, media, porn, sex, love, fashion and much more. gender politics affect us all and for that reason many argue that the study of gender politics is the most crucial area of modern life.
need i tell you how wrong they are?

the most important form of politics is of course office politics. each and every day it affects us all. no matter what size your office is there will be conflict, there will be tension, there will be cliques, there will be outsiders, and there will be leaders and followers. office politics is about influence, pecking orders and domination. most importantly it is about keeping abreast of how these things change, because if office politics is one thing then it is fluid. one day you are top of the heap and then the next day people don’t want to talk to you.
in order to know where you stand in the office you have to be able to read the signs, decipher the clues, and comprehend the code.

i work in a small office and every day there seems to be a new event that is like a seismic shift in the various delicately balanced alliances that keep the place working smoothly. perhaps it was an off hand comment, a joke that misfired, an unintended slight.
all of which make the workplace one of the most dangerous places to be in the whole wide world. sometimes solving the problems of the middle east would be easier to do than to navigate your way through the traps and cul-de-sacs of the maze of office politics.
the most recent battle to break out in the office has me smiling and giggling like a loon because of the stupidity of it. a small joke, admittedly only funny to two people, has been elevated to the level of an insult to every one of your ancestors, and the only way the insult can be wiped out is by a duel to the death. in one bad joke tension goes from being a like a fine mist to resembling a nuclear winter.

this kind of office dynamic is one of the reasons i love my job. if i won the lottery rollover jackpot tomorrow i would still go into work every day just for more the shenanigans of office politics.
i love it.

(there is the other great office tradition: the office secret. you know the thing i am talking about. there you are having a chat with someone when they turn around and tell you something and tell you they are telling you in strictest confidence. this is normally shorthand for “i have told several people exactly the same thing”. the special thing about the office secret is that it is never meant to be secret it is designed to get out be told to all and sundry. a few days ago i was told an office secret. in this case it came from the horses mouth. i filed it away and ignored it, as i knew he would tell the “secret” to others.
and he did.
today someone was about to tell me the “secret”, but i had to promise not to tell anyone – even though they had heard it from someone who was not the person involved in the “secret”.
i felt guilty that i didn’t pretend not to know.
i ruined the fun of the office secret.

these are the reasons i work.

probe

long time readers may remember my top tory totty list, in which i confess my guilty secret of finding several conservative right wing dames attractive. such is this desire on my part that i have had to call it the ttt.
there are a few conservative ladies who do not make it on there: ann widdecombe and mrs t are two very famous ones who just don't qualify for inclusion on the ttt. i am just not that perverse.
recently a tory dame from the past has resurfaced in london.
yes dame shirley porter has come back to london.
it appears that ken "the mayor" livingstone is hot for her as he calls for a "'urgent' dame probe". now to some with a kinky mind (yes that’s you shep and you jay..) this might be ken's way of saying "hey lets share a colonic" but fortunately dame shirley has awakened "red" ken and he is out for blood.
why?
well dame shirley was the leader of westminster council and was at the heart of the homes for votes scandal. after the 1986 election westminster council embarked on a policy known as "building stable communities", the main aim of which wasn't to build stable communities but to make sure that the tory council was re-elected.
one aspect of this was to sell off the council’s social housing to people who were more likely to vote tory. that would be rich people then. even better the houses were sold at an above average discount making them cheaper than they should have been and more attractive to the people who were more likely to vote conservative than they were labour.
it is estimated this form of gerrymandering cost the council £37 million.
i suppose if you are a tory supporter that might almost be considered a bargain.
but so much for the concept of a free market (but hell that sort of thing always goes out of the window when it suits).
the policy was declared illegal.
porter was ordered to pay costs of £27 million. she decided to leave the uk and live in israel, where she redistributed her own fortune (said to be £60 million) among relatives and trusts, which then allowed her to say her assets only amounted to £300,000. she eventually agreed to pay £12 million (obviously learning from the new testament how to feed the 5000 with a loaf of bread and a fish, she could make a fortune writing a self-help explaining how you go from £300,000 to £12 million! i don't suppose being the heir to the tesco’s fortune helped a bit?)

anyway after saying she was poor; dame shirley has once again taken her little bit of cash and somehow managed to buy a £1.5 million house in mayfair. i tell you bono needs this woman to solve african debt, she can turn nothing into a lot without breaking sweat...)

so ken is on the warpath as he wants "... an urgent investigation into whether dame shirley porter has committed perjury or any other offence at any stage in her court evidence and/or affidavits during the homes for votes scandal."

i am sure ken is aware that there is no way she would be made to pay more monies than she already has, i am sure he just wants to make sure that she isn't enjoying her return to london.

more power to his elbow, and let’s hope it a long hard probing she receives.

splashback

i have long hated summer, not sure anything is ever going to change my opinion on it.
sure there are lots of nice things about the summer: short skirts, tight shirts, bronzed cleavage... oh ok pretty all that is good about summer is the fact that the ladies look lovely. so i am shallow.
this summer i have survived a little better than previous summers. i can hear you all whispering "how pat? how?" simple gentle reader i finally bought myself some sandals. in the past i was adverse to such footwear because of the associations it had with folk music and getting old. well as i am getting old and there is a hip happening neo-folk music scene. pat is wearing sandals.
there are no socks worn with these sandals, as that would be a major fashion faux pas and it would make me look as if i was very old or an american tourist.
now i have to confess that the sandals are cheap and so there is a tendency that at the end of a long day for there to be a bit of a whiff, but it is a small price to pay for a lower body temperature and some soap and water in the evening brings everything back to normal...

however there is a major drawback to sandals that i feel i must report: the splashback. there you are in the toilet, standing proud at the urinal and pointing percy at the porcelain and letting fly with an almighty stream (oh ok a dribble) of pee, the relief of a fast emptying bladder is all too real, a sigh of pleasure and then suddenly you feel it. yes dear reader the splashback - the naked unprotected (but cool) foot registers a drop of fluid, you know it isn't rain and all it can be is a bit of a golden shower.
it has to be said it does take the edge of the pleasurable relief of emptying your bladder.
even worse when you have no option but to be there having a leak with strangers. is it mine or theirs that has splashed down on my naked foot? it doesn't bear thinking about.

the only thing worse is when it is so hot you have to wear shorts and then you can feel the splashback further up your naked leg! ugh ugh ugh.

but it is a small inconvenience to pay for being able to stay a little bit cooler during the summer.

blur

i know it is a cheap photo technique - open the shutter longer than you should and create blur. i have done it several times (and i think i will do it several more times).
this is me on the top deck of the 38, tottling down the roman. there is a trippy hippy feel to it all.
enjoy.

crap

imagine the scene. you used to be one of the most powerful men in your party. you used to be loved by the members of the party no matter what particular wing of the party they were. while outsiders may have vilified him, john was seen as being one of us. for the longest time he had one of the more complicated jobs in government and within his party he was seen as being the kingmaker.

but for john prescott, as with much of new labour, it all started to go wrong: two jags became two shags.his personal life causing more of a stink than his political failures, all leading to a downgrading of his role. but not his benefits. a public outcry and the perception that prezza had become one of them encouraged him to give up some of his grace and favours benefits.

and then there was the misunderstanding with philip anschutz where prescott accepted favours from a man he was dealing with over the set up of a super casino in the millennium dome.

all in all it has been a pretty shitty year for john prescott.

so why oh why when it has been suggested that he has had the balls and spine to criticise president bush’s administration had been crap when it came to the middle east “road map” has he denied he ever said anything of the sort. now true if i was john prescott i would be a little annoyed that a fellow labour mp (harry cohen) had tattletaled on me, and might be contemplating giving him one of my famous caught on tv not quite lennox lewis like punches.

cohen said believed mr prescott's comment had been "an honest and good point, well made", but didn’t go on to confirm that he himself was just causing trouble for the sake of it
colin brown (prescott’s biographer) said (while rubbing his hands at the increased sales of his book) of prescott’s language "it's a shorthand, it's very pithy, it's not diplomatic, and i hope that he doesn't get into any diplomatic hot water about it,"

prescott’s denial is more than likely due to the recent revelations that jack straw was eased out of office by the americans, and prescott (in keeping with many of new labour ministers is very very keen to keep his job for as long as he can…)
but in this one reported statement that bush, the bush administration and the handling of the “road map” as being crap has won prescott a huge amount of fans, new and old.

it is just a shame that the courage of his convictions has been lost along with his integrity during the latter days of the new labour administration.

pics

i am beginning to think i need to do a photo blog. but that is for another time.

here are some more of the the local area.

recently london seems to have become a very large building site. cranes are ubiquitous. i like cranes. i still wonder how they get built. i am sure it has been explained to me many times, it still seems like magic. given my love of solitude it would be a truly fantastic place to work. oh except i am not keen on heights.
one of the things that is interesting about the building that is taken place around london is how much of it involves knocking down old (and still functional) buildings and replacing them with new and hopefully functional buildings that have the wow factor but some how don't meld in with the local surroundings and although they are attempting to have that buzz factor always seem to look like a variation on a rogers or foster designed building - or if they are out there and totally different then they are so at odds with the rest of the environment they look silly.
true there are times when they just work and are wonderful to look at. the swis re (or erotic gherkin) is a case in point.
i like progress when it works - mostly we are replacing buidlings that have personality with buildings that have an identi-kit look to them.

the reason i am sharing these two photos is simply because they remind me of the martian tripods (even though they are not martians and are not tripods... it's artistic licence).
it was a blazing hot day. my back is towards commerical street. the building activity is taking place around the bishopsgate complex.






this photo is one of those common sight gags people with cameras like to do, and guess what i am not different.
my shadow stars in this photo. i think it is made by the shadow of the lamp post as well. once again this was taken by the truman brewery on grey eagle road.

pics2

some more pics from around and about.

this one of cobbles was taken to keep jay happy as i know it will remind him of his local area, where penny farthings are still seen as being the most fashionable mode of transport. but that is what comes of being in the midlands. i believe this is taken just down the road from where big brother used to be filmed. so it is a double jay hit.



i am not sure why i am fascinated by doors, but i am. perhaps it is the constant wondering about what is behind them, perhaps it is just that they always look forlorn and are just waiting to be opened, unlike my office door which always seems to be waiting to be closed.



and here is a street.

eavesdropping

we live in a world that is obsessed with celebrity. where we seemingly want to know all there is to know about each of these celebs.
of course it could be argued that there is an unspoken pact between us and the celeb: we will give you fame and adulation but in return we have to a level of access to your life that we would not grant into our own lives.
mostly we are interested in their public activities. oh fearne has her baps out – lets splash them over the paper, oh george michael wants a bit of rough - lets cover the papers in that. in the main the compact between celeb and fawning public works to all concerned benefit.
we had the moral panic over kate moss’ drug abuse (because we never suspected that she might be partying hard), the press crucified her. she loses loads of contracts. morality has won. moss apologises. the media praises her. contracts get re-signed. all is well in the world and all that has changed is that rich people have become richer.
true there are times when the press goes a little too far in search of its story, claiming it is in the national interest. we all know it is in the interest of their bottom line and our own prurient curiosity. our lives are no better for having read the stuff, but we have had a moment or two of pleasure.
for the media there are the twin defences of “it’s in the national interest” and “freedom of speech”.

for the sun and the news of the world (also affectionately known as news of the screws) there seems to be no end to the lengths they will go to get a “national interest” story. who can forget their exposes of how easy it was to get bombs into sensitive positions. (my pal paul told me a great story of one of these escapades – the journalist in question went up to a security guard and said “we got a box in here that had bomb written all over it”. to which security guy said “i will have to teach my sniffer dog to read then…” class.

so it comes as no surprise that the news of the world is involved with tapping into the phones of clarence house. now regardless of your feelings about the royal family (my own journey has been one of royalist, to republican to actually i quite like them being there for the entertainment value….) there comes a point where when the press is just eavesdropping on private conversations of people for the sake of a gossipy exclusive then we have toe say there is something wrong.
it is not just the fact that it is the royal family who have been listened to – but potentially anyone who has called them.
now given how useless the royals are the only reason for doing this is to gather dirt in order to sell papers. though as the princes are in the army it could be argued that the eavesdroppers were trying to get military secrets.

which allows me to make a comment on the current political climate: that of the ongoing war on terror. while the war on terror continues there are growing concerns that some (if not many) of the liberties that we take for granted are being taken away from us.

so it is a wonderful moment of irony when one of the organs that will go on about it’s right to exercise its right to freedom of speech and expression has once again managed to create a situation in which they will lose some of those journalistic liberties they should cherish.

mind you given the stance that the sun and the news of the world take with regard to law and order, maybe, just perhaps they will ask that those journos who are responsible for this are hung for treason. it’s just an idea.

pics

pictures from around and about.
mainly st giles high street. centre point is one of those buildings i like as it provides a location point in london. the view you have looking at the building shows denmark street where forbidden planet 1 used to, and st giles high street where fp 2 used to. back in the days when collectors of comics talked about non-distributed comics and when distributors brought comics in via sea-frieght.
i met the love of my life in the old fp shop, i queued to attend many a signing there (inlcuding one 2000ad signing that was delayed as police carried bodies out from a chinese gambling den that had caught fire the night before...)
now denamrk street is given over to music stores - even though i have no talent i still drool over the bass guitars.
the only thing that makes the area remarkable now is the hairdressers which is aimed at the chinese community. so there are occassionally hotties to admire.

centre point was recently the home of digby jones, ex of the cbi. i never saw him out and about in the local area.

enjoy

fopp

was a crap day – lots of work to do, too much having to explain to people about things i thought were resolved months ago have not been and so we have to go through the whole process again!
two things saved the day.
first being in coffee cake and kink and while enjoying my strong coffee and just relaxing i was confronted with the sight of leo sayer and his pilipino girlfriend coming into the store not to get a coffee but a sex toy. have to admire him.

coffeed up i set off to walk along tottenham court road. i am on the hunt for some new prostitute call cards. the moment i am on the road i can feel a strong attraction it might be mystical (arthur and excalibur) or it might has been akin to a scientific explanation (ala light failing to escape a black hole…) no matter what it was i could feel the pull, the tug dragging me from my original path and making me walk a different line.
with my new path decreed i was soon ensnared and trapped within the new fopp superstore on tottenham court road. and what a store it is. with cds from £3, £5, £7 and £10. with dvds at the same price point it is a little slice of nirvana on the high street.
true they have an eccentric racking system and unless you know just how they classify a band it might not be in the section it should. there is a lot to look at and to check and there are many many cds there that i want.
oddly they have an interesting john zorn cd collection (but as my luck would have it they were all £15 each, so not much better than getting them from play.com. mm let me check out modern folk, no 18th day of may (a little later there is the cd i was looking for in the metal and rock section.. no robert fripp stuff). look they have some tubes cd – all £15 (except the one i have), same for manhattan transfer and clutch. i get the feeling they don’t like me and my musical taste.
well i couldn’t find any robert fripp, no the necks, no espers…
but lots and lots of other stuff i could have bought.
interestingly for a store that is about cheap and uniform prices there are a few items that have prices that are so unrealistically high you have to wonder why they bother, (such as the rocky boxset dvd – retailing at £60 in fopp but really only £49 elsewhere.
but there are bargains to be had and your only problem is deciding how much you are going to spend….
so i left with 2 books and 5 cds, i got of light compared with what i could have spent….

i am now in love with fop. now i am just planning smoochy session with them

pics

more pics from around and about.
enjoy.

pics

some pictures taken by the thames, near the tate modern.
enjoy.

review

i know i know you have forgotten about the pat reviews, but i thought i would start to resurrect them. such a shame that the one i choose to do it with is a bad one.
so i remember really loving "miami vice" as a tv show, and the trailers i saw for the film version had me getting all kind of wet.
oh well it is a fact of life that trailers lie.

does the film have much to recommend it? a few things. gong li is exceptionally attractive. michael mann has once again proved he can film a city in such a way it verges on pornography. he has also managed to film one of the few dance club scenes that works, so credit to him there.

basically the heroes sonny crockett (colin farrell) and ricardo tubbs (jamie foxx) have to go undercover to discover who had snitched on one of their snitches and to find out where the leak is in the fbi's joint agency task force. they do this by becoming shit hot transporters of illicit materials. at first this takes them to jose yero, who everyone thinks is the main man. he is not. they also meet isabella (gong li) and she decides to take them to the main man, arcangel de jesus montoya(luis tosar - who plays bad by being impassive and very short with the words, for all the world he looks bored and that means he is as hard as nails).
there are complications because not only is there a leak. but there is also the ayran brotherhood (of course) (who unlike all the other bad guys in this film live in a trailer park - the rest are in spacious minimalist flats...) just to make it worse crockett decides that he is going to have a fling with isabella. in order to prove how macho he is crockett asks isabella for a drink she eventually agrees if he will take her fro a spin in his go-fast-boat (the sleek fast powerful speed boats that are favoured by smugglers), the bar she wants to go to is cuba. with nary a look at a map sonny hits the accelerator and off he goes.
sonny and isabella have sex. they fall in love. oh no interesting tension. well supposedly.
they get the big job. turns out that the ayran's are working with jose yero (jose double cross... sorry couldn't resist), they kidnap tubbs' love interest, trudy joplin (who just happens to work on the same team as tubbs, so nothing to worry about there).
so the ayran's know what they are carrying, they have kidnapped a love interest and they want the stuff delivered elsewhere. no way jose (sorry again). luckily trudy has given up a vital clue. and a quick scuffle (which has one of the best moments in the film) trudy is rescued and then blown up, but she is still alive. phew.
so crockett and tubbs have the stuff and now are ready to deal.
oh no jose has given up isabella to montoya (who earlier didn't care she was sleeping with crockett, now he does. drug lords are fickle).
all this leads to a big gunfight and the end of the movie.

mann takes great pains to make sure that each flick, click and snap of the cars, guns, boats and planes are fully recorded but when it comes to foxx and farrell he is content to let them mumble and spend moments being inaudible (i am guessing that is what the voice coaches they had were for as it couldn't have been for the accents).
the action is not shot in the way it was in the much superior heat, but it is close in and messy, which might make it realistic it also makes it uninteresting.
sometimes the film quality is no better than video.
the film almost makes no sense.

all in all a bit of a turkey.
more miami mess than miami vice.

pardon

did i read that right.
could be true that the mail on sunday - one of the establisments newspapers, the newspaper of middle england and of reactionary views - is going to have a cd of the songs of the stranglers...
i have to say i missed punk, i was only getting into music about then. meanwhile many of my contemporaries were going to gigs and being spat on by the likes of johnny rotten, to me it was just nothing. i did develope a liking for the stranglers. i liked their attitude, i liked their songs and i liked the fact that they could play.

as i understand it there are many arguments as to whether or not they were a real punk band. but they released great lps such as "rattus norvegicus", "no more hereoes", "black and white" and singles such as "grip", "peaches" "no more heroes" and "golden brown". perhaps their longevity has gone against them and they have become a safe band.

but it is still a terrible blow to their legacy to find out that the daily mail thinks it is a winning strategy for them to have a stranglers cd as a freebie. true i will be buying a copy, but then i can get angry at the bollocks written inside as well as getting excited by the tunes.

what is next a best of the the sex pistols free with the telegraph.

how punk has fallen, and how old we have all gotten.

bits

so some bits and pieces.

tommy sheridan wins his case against the new of the world. he is £200,000 richer and is now better known than he was before. perversely some people will probably think that there is no smoke without fire and that tommy is a bit of a lad. he should be a shoo in at his next election.
nice job those boys at the news of the world.

ridley scott has apparently been told his £7 million house is too much like a home filled with nostalgic bric-a-brac than it is a designer wet dream. now i am not one who can actually talk that much about interior design (my own personal look is based on early waste tip) but even i know that if you are going to live in a place then it has to be what you want and not something that some "expert" tells you is the right look. it seems even more bizarre that someone who people have to suck up to such as ridley scott, should care what others think. you would have thought that he would have been more of a "fuck 'em if they can't take a joke" type of person.
still it must be a great job telling people how to decorate their houses, creating a buzz about a "look" and never having to live in it. i think i would very much like to dictate style to people. i would laugh all the way to the bank.

look-a-like today someone said i looked like jerry garcia, but more healthy. then he mentioned charles darwin (i don't believe he was trying to chat me up. if he was his lines need some work on them). i mentioned i was more karl than charles. "are you a commie..." i think he was genuinely scared at that point. never has anyone shown that much relief at jumping on a circle line train.
i should be thankful that he didn't say i bore a resemblance to mad bad drunk mel gibson who with his big beard looked like a raving loony. can't wait to see his new movie, it promises to be epic and mad at the same time.
talking of looks johann hari of the independent has got a whole new look for his page in the evening standard (what is it with radical liberals who end up doing work at the evening standard - do they think they are somehow going to subvert the paper? or do they just like the cash?). anyway when he is pictured for his column for the indie - it is the earnest young man who stares out at us from the page. the concerned politically right on johann who feels the pain of the downtrodden. over at the standard he looks more the rakish chappie about town, less concerned with saving the world rather he is looking for a good time.
johann is gay, no biggie. his piece today was a criticism of george michael (not for his lamentable music - as that would have been acceptable- the last single i heard was while i was trapped in a queue in tescos, i was ready to slit my wrists by the end of it...) his argument seemed to be that because george is of a certain age and from a certain background he is a little embarrassed about his gayness and so goes cruising and cottaging for this reason. now i don't know george that well but i get the feeling that george isn't embarrassed about his sexuality he positively enjoys it (and he may as well do being one of the most visible gay blokes on the planet).
hari seems to contend that his generation of gay blokes are at home with their sexuality and so are no hanging around hampstead heath late at night or popping into gents lavs to check for signs of action. of course while the media might contribute to the "grim" lifestyle of someone like george michael because of the negative images they portray (i believe one paper had a headline of "zip me up before you go go") the self same media has not really had that affect on the young dynanmic thrusting (sorry couldn't resist) gay man.
hoorah for that gay man.
in the case of hari all this is undercut by his less than funny rent boy joke in which johann offered himself to michael for at least £500,000, its ok it is a positive images as gay bois are doing it for themselves, rather than a seedy take on it such as the sun might use.
it is a line that would not have made it into his column in the indie perhaps he is just someone who understands the key to the readers of each news organ he writes for.
as for george who needs enemies when you have friends like that...

railings

fron a tube station somwhere close to the tate modern, here are some railings. because jay asked for it there will be some more from this series posted tomorrow. i know they will be loved by all my fans of urban photography, especially paul who thinks i can't take a happy photo (in this case he would be right).