back

it looks like my internet problems are solved.
it looks like i am back.
it looks like i will be writing more rants.
it looks like you lot are going to be suffering my poor prose and even poorer puns.
it looks like the rain has gone and we can all see clearly now.
(have no idea where that came from.)

technology2

not been on for a while because i have screwed up my internet.
normal service will be resumed soon.

(longer version below.)

technology

gentle reader you may have been wondering where i have been, or you may have been thanking your lucky stars that you have been spared my brand of drivel. even so i think you deserve to hear why i have been absent.
currently i have an adversarial relationship with technology. sometimes it is my freeview box that just cuts out, or has a magical digital signal that works fine for all the really bad tv stations but doesn’t work at all on anything i want to watch. then there is the digital radio that turns itself on and off whenever it pleases, often in the middle of something i was enjoying listening to (and i will ignore the fact that the cd player on it has decided it will never work no matter what i do). shall i mention my dvd recorder that allowed me to record the recent (excellent) torchwood series and then decided at the very last moment to make the disc unplayable (not only did i lose the series, i also waved goodbye to the amiable film ‘cat ballou’). the ipod can’t be left out with its occasional moments of temperament when it just decides that the best option is to freeze. lovely. my mobile phone is a constant source of irritation i either lose if for periods or recently it has decided not to make a sound, leaving me to guess if i have been contacted (which to be honest is a rare occurrence anyway).
still the most recent technological disaster has been my loss of the internet. now i can take full responsibility for it going the way of all good things. i had stupidly taken the laptop to the local ‘idea store’, or for the old folk out there the local library (you can tell the difference between a library and an idea store thusly an idea store has wi-fi and computers and lots of people making lots of noise on their mobiles or just chatting (loudly) to each other, while sometimes eating smelly food. a library is quiet and has books. what me old fashioned? yes.) i was there to use the wi-fi. unlike anywhere else in the western world to use the wi-fi you have to reset everything on your settings. this i did. the really dumb thing was i didn’t make a note of what i was doing.
cluster fuck time.
get home and the internet and i are no longer intimate friends but acquaintances who have lost touch.
not to worry i can save this. i can rescue this. i can do this.
no. nope. nada.
worry time.
to cut an epic to a long story: i gave up and decided it was time to renew my broadband.

simple. so simple.
if only life was like that. really life would be great if it were that simple.
a period of reflection who to go with i plunk for bt.
a call to bt gives me more details and lets me know what information i need to provide them with, naturally enough i don’t have my customer reference number as i do that online (see the problem).
go to an internet café to log-in to my bt account. i am not recognised. what? ask them to send me my password again, but to answer all the questions they pose i have to see my bill (see the problem).
find an old email from bt click on the link to my online account and it takes me straight there (no need for a password or username, nice).
get customer reference number.
make the call to bt to place the order for broadband. now bt love their menus. so after a few minutes of digging down into the menu options i finally get to a point where i can place the order.
i do.
five working days.
fantastic.

the days go by.
internet hub has not turned up.
misery.

curse those post office employees for being on strike they are preventing me from getting back to the internet. now as a working class warrior (armchair division of the glorious galloway regiment, retired subs not paid) i can’t actually fault them for being on strike so i just grin and bare it.
ah my copy of last week’s socialist worker has arrived so the bt homehub can’t be far behind.
nope.
wrong.

apologies to the vanguard of the proletariat that are the postal workers, they were not to blame for holding up the bt hub.
no it was bt. the very helpful chap who took my order didn’t actually take my order.
a big thank you to him and may he have boils on his bum for the next ten years.

another game of going through the bt menu system and a new order placed.

so perhaps next week i will be online again.
keep your fingers crossed. i know some of you have been missing this.

no2id

with, yet another, change of tack in the implementation and purpose of the id cards perhaps now is the time for gordon brown to finally kick this unwanted (and unnecessary) piece of legislation into the very long grass.
it would save cash. it would be a vote winner.
even david cameron can see that, as he has written to several companies telling them not to sign long term contracts because he is going to scrap the scheme. have to say i agree with him.

one of the things we elect governments to do is to make the hard choice, the hard decisions that we, individually, would not do. the government should be seeing the big picture and operating in the best interest of society.
you can see why they thought that an id card scheme would be necessary and needed. yet they have failed to make the case for id cards stick. no one wants them. no one sees the need for the cards. opposition to the scheme has united people on the left and people on the right.

each time they change their approach the case gets weaker.
the only reason for continuing appears to be stubbornness on the part of gordon brown. (actually there might be a second reason they wish to continue with the scheme: the desire to push money into the hands of big business. governments seem to have a fetish for spending (well wasting) a lot of money on large-scale computer programmes. even worse business has a habit of promising the moon and providing a bit of swampland, but hey the free market always knows best).
this is the time when a good politician should step up to the crease (cricket, dear boy, and not that horrid baseball game) and admit they are wrong and they have decided to drop the scheme.
they won’t, but they should.

all the while gordon brown is passing on one of the promises he could easily make that would help restore his popularity. all he has to say is: no to id cards. simple really.


(more about saying no to id cards can be found here.)

evil

ever since eve took a chunk out of that granny smith there has been evil in the world. along with stupidity evil is one of the human traits you can find everywhere and every when. evil is a universal constant: always there.
evil comes in all shapes and sizes, it is perpetuated by individuals, groups and societies.
you only have to think of hitler, stalin, isle koch, elizabeth bathroy, spanish inquisition, the somme, agent orange, jeremy kyle and many others to get the idea.
i don’t want to paint too bleak a picture because as easy as it is to find evil, it is just as easy to find beauty. just the other day there i was wandering the halls of the tate modern, there you get a small glimpse into the creative soul of mankind. to stand in awe at the works of picasso and mondrian, to gaze with wonder at a lichtenstein or rothko, to be filled with wonder by hockney or wearing.
and that is just the art dear reader; i have glossed over the magic that can be found in literature and music or in film.
so while there is evil in the world there is beauty and joy too.
yet it was at the tate modern that i experienced my own personal moment of evil. it was not through the works of jake and dinos chapman with their dioramas of hell, that illuminate the darker aspects of man’s psyche, not was it in the canvases of francis bacon laying bare the diseased soul of humanity.
no fellow traveller this evil was more real than the art that fills the tate modern. this was real evil.
the evening was drawing to a close, i had enjoyed my walk around the per kikeby exhibition, but the time to go had come. feeling lazy i headed for the lifts. unusually a lift was there waiting. i get in. press the button for the second floor. doors close.
then it hits me. the evil strikes.
the perpetrator more mysterious than jack the ripper, the effects as lingering as mustard gas. yes, faithful reader, as the door clanged shut and the recorded voice told me which floor i was on i tasted evil, i smelt evil. i have no idea if when the initial crime had been committed it was an sbd (silent but deadly) but i can confirm that it lingered, it congealed, and it hung around the confines of the lift. trapped in that little space what had been to someone a simple fart had become a lethal toxic weapon.
vileness on a lovecraftean scale.
i am not sure i can ever enter a lift again, the trauma was so great.
somewhere out there a rasputin type character is cackling with glee knowing that one of his farts has claimed another victim.

i tell you now brothers and sisters there is evil in the world.
evil in the world.

buses

buses

there is something special about the bus. it is a microcosm of all that is right and wrong about the modern world. you can see people at their best and their worst.

it had been a pleasant day walking around london, a few galleries, a coffee or two. yet all things must come to an end, so homeward bound. joining the crowd (ah do you remember the good old days of when people knew how to queue? i do) waiting at the stop for the 25 bus. i settled back and prepared to wait. i let the first one go by as it was packed. easy to do, i wasn’t in a hurry.

one of the things about waiting for a bus is that you get to watch the people go by. a bit of a lecherous glance here, a giggle at a fashion faux pas there. the problem with looking around at people is that sometimes you just spot someone you wished you hadn’t seen.
there he was in all his glory. a very smart, neat black man who is carrying two canvases, the front one carrying the legend “ian tomlinson” the other one “mark quinsey”. he looks like he wouldn’t say boo to a goose; all that marks him out are the two canvases.

second 25 bus comes along. fewer people on it, fewer people getting on it. winner. hop on. sit down. get home. simple. i choose to sit close to the doors, hoping to get any cool fresh air that enters the bus.
canvas man sits down across from me.
doors close. the engines cough. bus moves off. canvas man starts to talk. he has a deep rich african voice. he is not talking to me, he is preaching to the bus.

he tells the assembled (captured?) passengers that he has been at a protest. he has been bringing to people’s attention that both ian tomlinson (died at the g20 protests) and mark quinsey (shot at army barracks in northern lreland) have been murdered. not just murdered, but murdered by the freemasons. not only were the freemasons in on it, but it was known about by the queen and sanctioned by a member of the queen’s family.
no one says a thing.
everyone knows it is better to let him rant. why? engage them in conversation or meet their eyes and you are trapped, you are going to be their bitch for the rest of the journey and they are going to talk to you and you alone. when that happens everyone else on the bus will just sit back and enjoy your discomfort.
so he is studiously ignored.
to his credit he doesn’t care. he just goes on.

every two stops he just starts to tell the story again.
around the fourth telling he adds more detail and colour to the tale.
the queen is still involved. so are the freemasons. now arabs and muslims are involved. hypnotism is added to the mix. throw in a little girl who looked at him, she did this, he informed the bus, in order to trap him on charges of paedophilia.
well when you add all of that up you either have one serious cover up that needs to be on the front page of the daily telegraph (if only he could have woven expenses into the narrative) or you have the ramblings of a fractured mind.

whatever the state of mind is the story is repeated like a broken record, does that analogy work in the digital world?

as i listened i wondered if in the world of conspiracy theorists there are people who are considered to be just too far out there, that even the david ickes of the world consider to be nutters?

say what you will about the bus but there are times when you get more than you bargained for.

500

five hundred years ago henry tudor became henry the eighth, king of england.
he was a bit of a renaissance man. a man of words, a man of action. a lover and a fighter.
before he became king he received some advice on how to live his life from jack skelton, his first tutor. some of them were banal such as "don't be mean". whoa, radical stuff to put before a king. don't worry skelton had a trick or two up his sleeve.
one of the maxims skelton offered prince henry was:
"don't deflower virgins, do not violate widows."

words to live by my friend.
words to live by.

euros

the two stories of the night are the decline of labour and the bnp winning two seats. a far bit of drivel spoken about both.

no shock that the european elections has proved to be a disastrous night for the labour party. talk about shooting yourself in the foot. thanks to people like ian gibson, who resigned because he didn’t like the way he was treated over his expense (still not to worry his daughter has a flat out of it) or hazel blears, resigning before she was reshuffled. james purnell, resigning in the hope that others would follow him to bring down gordon brown, but they didn’t. or caroline flint, one moment a loyalist, the next moment throwing her rattle out of the pram because she didn’t get the job she wanted.
mostly these seem to be about personality, none of them seem to have come forward with a plan on how to resolve either the expense row or how to steer a course through the economic crisis.
it is true that gordon brown is not the most charismatic of people, but he does seem to be the person who has at least an idea of what to do. if only his party would stop fighting itself.

my favourite comment from the night came right at the death when a tory mep said that if we had a different system then the bnp would not have been voted in.
i am still amazed that so many people can be for democracy but only when it provides the results that we agree with.
over the course of the night on the radio one of the big stories was the potential success of the bnp. lots of stuff about it being a dark night for democracy, various pundits making sure that they got their sound bite on how “depressed” “disgusted” they were that the bnp had polled so many votes. given the tone of the comments you would have thought that we were witnessing an updated version of krystallnacht and that the bnp had stormed the polls, rather than they won two seats. previous experience shows that they will prove to be ineffective in power and they will be out at the next election.
all the thunderous words of condemnation of the talking heads does is make sure that the bnp remain in the public view, that they get a chance to air their opinions, (and i would argue that part of the reason for the success of the bnp in this election was in part down to all the free advertising they got from the media worrying about the bnp benefiting from the expenses fallout.

lost in all of this was the fact that the green party won two seats, and increased their share of the vote, but that is a positive story and that doesn’t sell the news.

if labour does not buck its ideas up then the results are a signpost to their future: the wilderness.

meltdown

listening to gordon brown giving a press conference about his cabinet shuffle. he has never been seen as the most gifted of speakers, that said you can tell that he is a man who is a man who wants to do a good job, and he believes he has the answers to the problems that face the country.
throughout the press conference he went on about how he wasn't complacent but that he was resolute, yet each time he said it you just got the feeling that even he knows that the end is drawing closer and closer.
that the government is in meltdown was further strengthened by the news during the press conference that one of his ministers, caroline flint, resigned and was pretty scathing in her comments.
whatever happened to loyalty?
whatever happened to working for the public good?
that seems to have deserted the labour party.

i don't want to see gordon brown resign from the job at hand (and during his press conference he said several times that he wasn't going to walk away, almost as if he was a country and western singer) but i do want to see him grab the labour party by the scruff of the neck and take control of labour members of parliament, remind them what is at stake and make sure that they work together to make sure that the conservatives have no chance of winning the next election.
(and if the thought of the conservative party in power is not bad enough, then the thought that we will hear more from eric pickles should be enough to scare us all).

oh and i have a pony as well, just to throw a calvin and hobbes reference in there to lighten the mood.

why

why on earth are kajagoogoo getting back together?
why on earth are kajagoogoo touring?
does anyone care?
surely this is a sign of the coming apocalypse?

there should be laws against this sort of thing.

tosser

there are times when all you can do is scratch your head and wonder, not quite jaw dropping but almost. my working life was filled with moments like that when the only sane response was: “they did what”?
british politics is going through a head scratching moment that is veering towards the jaw dropping.
there are two major problems that face british government the credit crunch/crisis and the mess that is the expenses of members of parliament. ideologically the conservatives and labour may have differences of opinion on how to steer a course through the economic crisis. so far it seems that labour have more answers than the conservatives. on that basis it is a case of more of the same please when it comes to who runs the country.
the expenses question is one that involves all the main parties working together to create a new clean and transparent system, which also means making sure all the freeloaders are named and shamed. on that basis it seems too sensible not to call an election until the system is cleaned up.
i can understand why the scottish nationalists and plaid cymru are planning to table a commons motion to call for an immediate general election. david cameron’s reasons for agreeing with them are little more than political game playing as he and his team just keep going on about how little authority gordon brown has, while providing little in the way of concrete solutions to the issues of the day.

it is accepted that labour is going to suffer some serious losses in the county and european elections. most of those losses can be laid at the feet of the expense fiasco because voters are giving the party in power a bloody nose.

there is to be a cabinet reshuffle and it was also going to be likely that jacqui smith and hazel blears were going to lose their posts, both chose to resign before they were pushed. this has become gordon brown has lost two of his ministers – it makes for better press that way.
james purnell, who was the secretary of state for work and pensions, has now resigned. in his resignation he calls for gordon brown to stand down in order to give labour a fighting chance to beat cameron and the conservative party in the next general election.
mmm i wonder who is smiling at that resignation letter? oh no need to struggle with the answer it would be david cameron. so now the tories have some meat to their claims of a government in disarray. so thanks very much for that james purnell, thank you for making it even more likely that cameron gets in. thank you james purnell for making sure that the next few weeks are taken up with wittering and twittering among politicians as they plot, scheme and jockey for position. thank you james for making sure that politicians are not focused on the job of running the country but more concerned with internal wrangling.
step forward james and take a bow, you have done the conservative party a great service.

as for you barry sheerman if you want a vote to change the leadership – don’t do it by secret ballot, let us see a show of hands, let us see exactly who we can hold responsible for any changes that take place. if labour mps are too shy to take ownership of their view on who should lead the party then perhaps they should not be voting on it.

the sad part of it all is that all this has done is make sure that we have a conservative government after the next election. i am already dreading it, something else i can thank james purnell for.

quote

while i am not adverse to a chat and a natter i am not one of life’s most approachable people, i wear a scowl that seems to say “leave me alone, i am not interested”. mostly that is a perfect state of affairs for me. ever so occasionally i get dragged into a conversation with a stranger.
i am not comfortable with this for the simple reason i have never really learnt the art of knowing when a conversation has come to it’s natural end (these days i know by the glazed look of fear in people’s eyes “will he never shut up” they seem to say).

so there i am on sunday walking down brick lane. the weather was too hot for me (expect lots of moans about the heat in the coming days, weeks and months) though i was still cocooned in the happy glow of a decent cup of coffee. there is a part of brick lane that has become a little bazaar where people rock up to sell any old bits and bobs that they have. one chap seemed to have a leather coat for sale. i wasn’t interested in buying it but he had hung it up on the wall and it made for an interesting picture. i asked him if i could take a few snaps of the coat. he said yes. he commented on the camera, we chatted.
it was one of those chats where it wasn’t so much a dialogue but two overlapping monologues that had the appearance of a conversation.

i learnt he was out of work, was a physicist, liked walking, did photography, enjoyed a drink, was involved with a collective of artists, had problems with an ex. all the usual broad strokes you quickly get.
most importantly he provided me with a great quote: “i drink, i fuck, i occasionally shoot photographs”.
on that sunny sunday afternoon it sounded like the perfect advice on how to spend your day.

contrition

a lot can be said about the current expense row that is rocking parliament.
one of the things that seems to be lacking is the perfect apology.
thanks to a member of the public i think i have found the right words for the various members who get caught with their hands in the kitty.
now i live in an area that is filled with a lot of lads who put an inordinate amount of effort into maintaining face, they strut and swagger down the street (well some waddle thanks to their low slung jeans) courtesy is not the done thing – it is a sign of weakness. this is especially true when it is the boy racers who are involved. their shiny gleaming cars all sounding like overworked hoovers.
so there i was today minding my own business walking to the shop when two lads in cars have it out because one had impinged on the other.
i miss what the first chap says. luckily i catch what the second says. i say lucky because i think that it is perfect balance of apology, challenge and belief that they did nothing wrong.
so for members of the conservatives, labour and liberal parties i give you the apology you need to use whenever you are confronted by a tax paying member of the public.
“yeah my fault, sorry, fuck you.”
perfect.

need

there is a difference between needing something and wanting something.
i need food, but i want cream cakes.
i need sandals, but i want trainers.
i don't need books, but i want books.
i don't need dvds, but i want dvds.

i am man enough to admit that a lot of it is greed. all of which is complicated by the fact i suffer from collectoritis.

all that said somethings you see and you know that want and need come together in a blinding flash of beautiful obviousness that there is no denying that the object in question should be owned.
i give you the helmet of thor, crikey it is a dream come true. i need it. i want it.






by my troth, but verily tis a lovely thing.

bright

it was a bright warm day.
sweat came easy. sneezing came easier (no not swine flu, but hay fever).
great relief to see it is supposed to be blowy and rainy all of the coming week.
but i saw that on the daily mail website - so it is unlikely to be true.

lottery

well i didn't win the euro lottery.
guess i will have to get a job or become a member of parliament. (oh such topical humour from me.)

runner

i am back on the running trail again. like most things these days i just don’t seem to stick at it for very long. i am getting fickle, as i grow older.
i like to run. running is a lot like sex for me: i do it alone, it is a lot of effort for a small pay off and anything like a headache will keep me tucked up in bed.

i like to run when there are few people around so that means either early morning or late at night, for the moment i am running in the morning.
i confess i still long for that rocky moment when i run up the steps dance and punch the air. for the time being i am just settling for making it back to my flat (i should also mention that there are no steps around for me to do the rocky dance, but hope springs eternal).

the big surprise for me has been discovering that most of my favourite albums are not that suitable to run to. when the albums work they keep me running with the occasional burst of singing and air guitar (which must thrill the people who see me).

if i run in the morning it is a great start to the day, invigorating. if i run late at night it is a great way to relax and unwind. when i run i find myself thinking, the thoughts running further and faster than my slow feet, that slap and pound the floor the thoughts slip and slide ninja style.
the run today had me thinking about why are there hidden tracks on cds or easter eggs on dvds? why? why? why? i continued to work out what was the point of danny dyer. still no answer. i came up with a great game for the iphone; sadly as i have no idea how to programme computer games it will go nowhere (but it would have been a great hit). had an idea for an art book. it would be a winner if i could ever get it sorted. more left field was the idea for a watch (to be called the iwatch); it was an odd thought because i don’t wear watches. i wondered why paperback novels have gotten fatter over the years and how wonderful it is to find a novel that is around 200 tightly plotted and well-written pages rather than the overblown 500 pagers that fill the shelves. the thoughts kept coming: just how does david caruso get away with his acting and why is it so addictive? he has developed a minimal version of overacting – it is fantastic. then there are the thoughts of things i need to buy and the things i need to do.
thoughts just tumble and rumble, some roughhousing others out of the way.
i am pretty sure paula radcliffe doesn’t have such thoughts; she is too busy counting the cash she is earning. oh slap me for being cynical.

an unintended consequence of running is that my bowel movements have become that much easier, slipping out like a silk hankie from a pocket. wonderful.

crikey i am already looking forward to the next run.

flu

i can't help but think that swine flu is no more than a lazy pig phoning the butcher and saying "oink can't come in my nose is running oink cough oink".
media coverage of it is at panic levels that should only be reserved for the confirmed decline of western civilization and not for a few sniffles.
i know we are all looking for things to take our minds off of the credit crunch and the impending conservative government (come on gordon you can pull it around, you can - you just have to believe, oh and cut down on the number of stupid things that happen such as the mcbride smear tactics idea (what were you all thinking?) but i don't think creating an over the top panic is the best way around it.

all that said: remember to catch it, bin it and kill it.

pat's public health message for the day.

boris

it must be great being boris johnson. there you are in a position of power and responsibility and you can make bold statements that you don’t have to make good on because they are outside your purview. (a little like being the leader of the liberal party).

in talking about the various bail-out schemes and fiscal stimulus that the government have initiated in order to get the economy though the current financial crisis boris points out that the debt that has been built up will be paid for by all of us. boris says, "everybody, i am afraid, is going to have to pay that off in much higher taxes all round."
in a sense it is fair that it is that way. after all it is a national situation (well more an international problem) and propping up the banks was necessary so that we can all get on with our lives. the government has intervened to try to protect the market. we all benefit from that; we all suffer if it fails. so we all bear the brunt of it.

except boris doesn’t mean everyone.
indeed some people shouldn’t pay higher taxes.
for boris the new 50% tax for those earning over £150,000 (phew members of parliament are safe then, as long as we don't count their expenses) are a return to the “soak the rich” approach of the 1970s and would harm london. for boris “london is the motor of the uk economically. we need to send out a very positive signal about the enterprise culture we have in london."
in other words the rich shouldn’t be taxed because they might leave and we need them to stay here because they are the ones that power the economy and we all benefit from them. which sort of ignores the fact that these masters of the universe got us into this mess, and that much of the debt we have is due to the government bailing them out.
that doesn’t matter. you have to look after the rich, after all the rest of us benefit from the crumbs that fall from their table, we should be thankful (doff cap).
as the song says:
it's the same the whole world over, 

it's the poor what gets the blame, 

it's the rich what gets the pleasure, 

isn't it a blooming shame?


in sounding his call to the conservative party not to implement the tax rise, but at the same time saying that we will all have to pay, boris johnson is showing us that really the conservatives haven’t really changed and that they are just interested in making sure that their pals in business are looked after. they know that if they don’t they won’t have a directorship to go into when they leave politics.

break

had a bit of a break from here. it has turned out to be much longer than i thought it would be.
one of the problems of the post employment state is the complete loss of any timeframe.
would like to say my batteries are recharged and i am flowing with creative juice (just bubbling with coffee i am afriad) but i am back to wow and thrill, to entertain and educate, to tell tales of wonder and spin stories of flatulence (which is next to flaunt in my dictionary which proves it is fine to let one go in public. really. honest).
in short it is business as usual.