If it wasn't for the girls in marketing, we'd have to get blow jobs off our wives

So that's almost that for 2007 then. Looking back I'd say there have been a number of highs, a number of lows and a fair amount of stuff in-between. My prediction for 2008 is that it will be much the same. However, I will endeavour to maximise the highs and minimise the lows and make better use of the fair amount of stuff in-between. I will be making one New Year's resolution, the same two word resolution I've made every year for a good few years now*.

I like end of year lists. The favourite this, the most despised that. It's fun to see what others think when with shared interests. I'd add a disclaimer to "I like end of year lists". I have no interest in the top ten amusing Amy Winehouse stories or Eastenders quotes, they have to be lists that interest me, others are for others. So if you have no interest in my top ten movies, gigs and albums, then cheers for reading this far, happy New Year, please pop in again soon. For those that do, then cheers for reading on past this bit, happy New Year, please pop in again soon.

I'm not going to give reasons for my choices, omissions or placings. This is partly because many of my reasons are far from sound, and partly because I couldn't do so without gesticulating like an amphetamine crazed gibbon.

Top 10 Movies:
1) Letters From Iwo Jima
2) Joe Strummer - The Future Is Unwritten
3) Cashback (US release only)
4) Mr Brooks
5) 3.10 To Yuma
6) Stardust
7) American Gangster
8) This Is England
9) Die Hard 4
10) Sunshine

Top 10 Gigs:
1) The Who (Glastonbury)
2) The Broken Family Band (Glastonbury)
3) Okkervil River (The Lumiere)
4) The Raveonettes (Cambridge Barfly)
5) Maximo Park (Glastonbury)
6) The Shins (The Astoria)
7) The Duke Spirit (The 229 Club)
8) The National (Shepherd's Bush Empire)
9) Aimee Man (Indig0)
10) Adam Green (Union Chapel)

Top 10 Albums:
1) Sandy Denny - Live At The BBC
2) Okkervil River - The Stage Names
3) The Broken Family Band - Hello Love
4) Maximo Park - Our Earthly Pleasures
5) The Shins - Wincing The Night Away
6) Dinosaur Jr - Beyond
7) Bright Eyes - Cassadaga
8) Neil Young - Chrome Dreams 2
9) Bruce Springsteen - Magic
10) Radiohead - In Rainbows


*It' not 'more sex' although I would consider trading it.

Listening to an old compilation CD Smudge gave me

When i walk beside Her, i am the Better Man

Listening to Music from the motion picture Into The Wild by Eddie Vedder

A Little Japanese Girl That I'll Never Know

It's time to play the iTunes Oracle. As I reached home on Monday, after my last day in the office this year, poddy pulled off one of those lovely shuffle moments where two songs mix beautifully into each other. In this case it was the Joe Strummer soundbite: Without People You're Nothing and Luna's Tiger Lily. Try it, it works. I don't know why this sublime little combination reminded me of the Oracle, it just did.

I first read about the Oracle on Pat Tomek's blog. Pat Tomek was the drummer in The Rainmakers, arguably one of the greatest bands ever to have come out of the US. You can try arguing the toss with me about that one but I'll only have to come over and burn your house down. That I once passed up an opportunity to see them live, will shame me till the day I croak.

The Oracle can be played on any digital media player with a shuffle. It's like a stupidly fun blend of the IChing, a magic eight ball and whatever's on your iTunes (or other digital media player). So what you do is this: set your player on shuffle and then ask each of the following questions in turn. As you've asked the question, hit next and the song that plays is your answer.

So here we go:

(Oh, before we start, I should say that my iTunes library currently holds only 998 songs, a small selection of what I hold on silvery disc, but that's all we have to work with today.)

Q) How does the world see you?
A) Listened On / Lightning Dust (something most people have never heard of, but some might quite like if they did?)

Q) Will I have a happy life?
A) Abel / The National (great tune, but it's kinda about losing control. Oh dear...)

Q) What do my friends really think of me?
A) Oxford Town / Bob Dylan (Maybe they all think I'm smart? Or a hippy. Hmm... Actually, this song's about racial divide in the US, so maybe everyone thinks I'm a humanitarian and hopefully not a racist!)

Q) Do people secretly lust after me?
A) They Can't Buy The Sunshine / Turin Brakes (Yeah, lust away, but I'm on to you and I can't be bought. Which is probably so far from the truth!)

Q) How can I make myself happy?
A) Just Because / Jane's Addiction (Heroin, rockin' out? I think this song means just be yourself.)

Q) What should I do with my life?
A) Evil Walks / AC/DC (Find myself someone with a flying broomstick?)

Q) Will I ever have children?
A) A Million Miles Away / The Rainmakers (Not for a while then, looks like broomstick girl has other plans.)

Q) What is some good advice for me?
A) Girls In Their Summer Clothes / Bruce Springsteen (Now that's more like it.)

Q) How will I be remembered?
A) Pink Bullets / The Shins (from SongMeanings: "i guess its about finding someone that changes you because they are so different, in the best way, from everyone else. its about being affected by someone so strongly, that when you lose them and nothing in your life seems to make sense, you still wouldnt want to forget them". I'll settle for that.)

Q) What is my signature song?
A) Blizzard of '77 / Nada Surf (No matter how long it's been, I never forget those who've touched my life, even when they are no longer in it. Sometimes you get a chance to make peace with your past.)

Q) What do I think my current theme song is?
A) Everywhere I Go / The Black Keys (This is one of the horniest pieces of music I've ever heard. One of my fantasies is to have the woman in my life slowly strip to it. I even know what I want her to be wearing! I know how cheesy that sounds, but once you've heard it you'll get it. I have the tune, so that's a start.)

Q) What does everyone else think my current theme song is?
A) Can't Get There From Here / R.E.M. (This is one of my favourite R.E.M. songs, Fables is one of my favourite R.E.M. albums, and that's as far as I can go with this one.)

Q) What song will play at my funeral?
A) P.S You Rock My World / Eels (A song about funeral's, love, hope, and embracing the future. I love this song, it's a beautiful track and I'd be honoured if someone wanted to play it at my funeral.)

Q) What type of men/women do I like?
A) Mrs Rita / Gin Blossoms (This is far closer to the bone than I'd care to admit.)

Q) What is my day going to be like?
A) Simple Man / Lynyrd Skynyrd (It wasn't this morning, I had to head into the smoke to do some final Christmess shopping, but it will be for the rest of the evening.)

Try it. Have some fun. Feel free to post your own results in the comments.


Watching: Battlestar Galactica Season 1 (new version)

Kindness is a card game

When I first moved to Tooting, I'd just returned from working on this horrendous no-budget movie shoot in Brighton, where, by the end, everyone involved had somehow managed to hurl themselves wholeheartedly into the deep end of the insanity pool.

The art of stair-surfing pre-dates Mainline Run by a few months, but it wasn't until Tooting that it developed into an art-form. The original idea was to see if we could get down the stairs on an ironing board. The answer to that is no. What tends to happen is that the front end gets caught in a stair and the 'surfer' hits the bottom without hitting a single stair on the way down. I don't remember too much about the details; you have to be fairly steamed to try such a stupid idea out in the first place.

In Waterloo Street we built upon the concept of bumping down stairs on your arse by adding more alcohol, in-journey drinking, water weapons, lying down, going backwards and eventually a combination of all together. That, I don't recommend as it could incur some serious and permanent damage. It was a hoot.

I thought stair-surfing had pretty much died out until the other day when this guy came sailing towards me down the escalator at Waterloo. Backwards. A couple of us managed to prevent him from carrying on to the bottom, for which he seemed to be reasonably grateful.

Watching: Eastern Promises
Listening to: Steve Earle and the Bluegrass Dukes

Profiteers on dream street

Every year since 2001, I've dispensed with the idea of Christmas cards and put together a compilation CD of my favourite songs, from albums released that year.

Afraid of Christmas 2007 is ready.

There are a couple of tracks that have sneaked in from 2006 but for good reasons. You get to feel smug if you can spot 'em.

Love Your Man, Love Your Woman: The Broken Family Band, from Hello Love
Surrender: Dropkick Murphys, from The Meanest Of Times
Gypsy Biker: Bruce Springsteen, from Magic
Bushes and Briars: Sandy Denny, from Live At The BBC
Plus Ones: Okkervil River, from The Stage Names
House of Cards: Radiohead, from In Rainbows
Grace Kelly: Mika, from Life In Cartoon Motion
No One Would Riot For Less: Bright Eyes, from Cassadaga
White Chalk: PJ Harvey, from White Chalk
Russian Literature: Maxïmo Park, from Our Earthly Pleasures
Plywood Superman: Jim White, from Transnormal Skiperoo
When You Go: Lightning Dust, from Lightning Dust
Aly Walk With Me: The Raveonettes), from Lust Lust Lust
Turn On Me: The Shins, from Wincing The Night Away
Baby Fratelli: The Fratellis, from Costello Music
What If I Knew: Dinosaur Jr, from Beyond
Without People You're Nothing: Joe Strummer, from the OST to The Future Is Unwritten

The cover image is of New York at night.

All is well in hell, wish you were here

Last week, I woke up after a work leaving party, with the reigning champion of no food bourbon and champagne hangovers. I tenderly crawled off to work, brain pounding, backs of the eyes screaming through my pre-flight checks: wallet, oyster card, money, phone, iPod... It was that moment that I was able to answer the question: 'what had I been up to on the way home the night before'?

I had been playing AC/DC at full volume.


Listening to: Afraid of Christmas 2007

You guys had me at blood and semen

Now all this is over, I can hopefully get back to some more of this.

It's been a tough month. The culmination of a year of work and the most ambitious and complex thing we've done since I started. And in the end it was all good. But none of the considerably deserved excitement could compare to that of getting Iron Maiden tickets. I suppose you could call that work-life balance.

Your time has come

I'm just about to sit down to do some work. It's been many a year since I brought work home for the weekend but we're two days from launch and needs must. I won't begrudge a chunk of my weekend for the satisfaction of getting this release out.

Prior to starting, I spent a few moments browsing some old bookmarks.

I found a stream of a new Black Mountain song on Pitchfork.

I urge you to click the link and listen to this song as loudly as humanly possible.

Off to work now.

Listening to Black Mountain's Tyrants

One two three four five SIX SIX SIX

I read yesterday that they're organising a massive Big Brother reunion party. Apparently there have been something like 112 contestants over the years and they're trying to get as many of the old house mites in as possible.

So I guess all we have to do is phone up a 'friendly' airforce and tell them there's some insurgents about 5 blocks away.

Kindness is a card game

I have a confession to make.

I'm quite partial, as they say, to the Pret a Manger Christmas sandwich. It's a pleasant enough run in to that orgiastic celebration of spending that commemorates the birth of a dude who wasn't really all that materialistic as I understand it. But then again, he probably never had a John Lewis nearby. Still, hey, that'll teach 'em for hijacking the all the good Pagan festivals. Oh and for those of you currently shaking your heads at my Revelations, I also like Adam Sandler movies, Poison, and live on a boat, so anyone wanting to question my judgement, I'm right up there behind you.

Anyway, sandwiches.

Turkey breast, pork and herb stuffing, fresh leaf spinach, crispy onions, cranberry sauce and mayo on malted wholegrain bread. It's not bad really. OK, so you pay a bit extra, retails at a lunchingly bodacious £3.25, 30 to 40p over the average, but I'm not terribly badly paid so I can afford one if the mood takes me. I'm not entirely sure which of those ingredients drives the price up; suppose it must cost a little extra to crisp those onions. I do love crispyonionmess time though.

But that's all ok because 10p from each one sold goes to homeless charities. And that's a good thing. And they also give all their unsold sandwiches to homeless shelters at the end of each day which is a damn sight better than chucking them.

Now, I'm also partial (as they say) to an Innocent smoothie. And I'm particularly happy that the old honey, lemon and ginger is back because it's ace. Now Innocent also like to give a little to charity at this time of year. And to prove it they knit these little bobble hats for the tops of their bottles which are about as much use as genital warts on your wedding night but they are cute. They also give 50p from each one sold to Age Concern. And the price of the drink stays the same.

So I wonder who's really doing the giving.

Listening to Bright Eyes: Cassadega

Lust

After one of the worst days at work in living memory last Thursday, I set out to catch up with some good good people and to listen me poddy on numerous trains as well as catching some top gigs.

Kicking off at the newly refurbished St Pancras gave me the chance to see the statue of the lovers embracing. They were meant to be kissing, but apparently the organisers / self-important arse grinders and annihilators of all that is good and holy (delete as you think applicable) thought it would be too risque. Since when did we live in a world where the thought of two lovers sharing a kiss as they meet or part is a problem? Doesn't stop their live counterparts on the platform so why aren't the Pancras politburo chasing them off with a damp towel? Should Rodin have lived in such unenlightened times.

Gary Larson (creator of The Far Side) once said he thought the reason some people found some of his cartoons offensive was that they were stuck in time, forever in that one moment, that there was never a resolution. And that's how we've damned these giant bronze frustratees. I like to think that in the early hours of the morning when everyone's gone they get to indulge in some lustful lip locking.

Dan lent me Zodiac Mindwarp's 'autobiography', which I started reading between Nottingham and Cambridge. It's clear to me that reading a book so vividly and clearly entitled Fucked By Rock won't make you attractive to members of the opposite sex. If it does then you should probably avoid them like an about to burst bubonic boil. I don't know whether this book makes me want to laugh, cry or puke my ring. This may indeed be the point. It makes Motley Crue's The Dirt read like a Ladybird preschooler.

It is a great title though.

Somewhere amongst the onanastic smacked by bitch up junk soaked white line feverish coprophiliac cardiac grinning tales of under-age sodomy and anal torture I found the following passage:

"The people of Western countries live their lives beneath frail illusion that are different yet fundementaly the same.
Culture, Language, and Religion are merely different shades of the same dream.
The one we call civilization.
And it is as fragile as a sparrow's bones.
True war, as Claus von Clausewitz, the military theorist tells us, is the only thing that shows us as we really are.
Beasts.
And this is why we need these illusions.
Illusions that have evolved over the years, with laws and enforcers of laws to sustain them.
Governments, armies, judges, police officers.
Not so long ago, Westerners believed that certain human beings were animals and bought and sold them to work in cotton fields and sugar plantations.
In a society like this, it is hard for people of a sensitive and intelligent nature to stay sane. Surrounded on all flanks by the contented and the delude, who sunbathe beneath satellites of cynical lies and twisted half truths concocted by the rich and powerful."

It goes on a bit longer but you get the gist.

So this morning the Doctor and I were returning from breakfast when some wanker in a flashy BMW took an illegal right turn off Kingston Bridge and almost ran us over. The Doctor, nearly correctly, called him a tosser. Car stops. 'Man' gets out and informs us that he has two ten year olds in the back and they don't need to hear words like tosser. I think the irony of him repeating the word tosser in front of two ten year olds who don't need to hear the word tosser may have been lost on him. As is his getting out and shouting at two grizzled veterans of the war on sanity.

Only buses and taxis can make that turn. A ha, he tells us, we don't realise his car is a licenced taxi. Yeah, right. Because an overpaid baboon like you would ever let a stranger in his mechanised cock replacement. I should have asked him if he'd take us back across the bridge or if the kids in the back were going to tip, but he was too busy pretending he had his documents in his wallet. That and the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, Lord Lucan and Madeleine McCann. Ape-boy's just using the taxi loophole so he doesn't have to pay the congestion charge. Should have got his number. This ladies and gentlemen is the future, the bastard offspring of Thatcher's demonic coiffure and her grinning toy-boy, Tony, and all his evil minions. There is a word for retards like this and it ain't tosser.

2 less letters.

Begins with a c.

I digress. It was great to get out of town, to get away from work, to sit up late drinking drinks and talking tunes. It felt like a holiday, a rest, a revitalisation, a charge for the old carbon batteries.

To Mr H, Ms C and their collective cats and co, thank you for your hospitality and for your company. And for not waking me up early.

And as they say somewhere east of here: thank you for the music.


Reading Mark Manning's Fucked By Rock
Listening to The Raveonettes' Lust Lust Lust

It was over in seconds

Something horrible happened to me this morning. My little poddy froze on me just as I was leaving for work. No time to stop to reset it as I was determined to be on time for once; on time for a train that was first delayed and then cancelled.

The trauma of losing poddy for the day meant that I had to face the hour and a half or so it takes me to get from play door to work door without being cushioned from the inanity of my commute by some pleasant tunes. I'll say now that I'm not a great commuting reader unless I'm on a long journey. I do pick up the Metro on the way in and the London Paper on the way out but only for the Sudokus and the rest of the paper I can pretty much finish within three station stops. Reading the free papers in the evening isn't really a great idea because they tend to suck the intelligence from you, especially the London Lite which is the literary equivalent of used toilet paper, although they proudly proclaim that the shit doesn't come off in your hands.

Commuting is one of those things many of us have to do. Dictionary.com defines the word commute as "to travel regularly over some distance, as from a suburb into a city and back". As far as I'm concerned the word commute simply means getting to work. If you have a job that's not at home then you commute, even if it's next door. You're just lucky you don't have far to go.

I don't mind commuting particularly. I get a train, a tube and then walk. It's some time to rest before work, more so if I can mostly cut the world out and listen to some Neil Young. Yeah, the trains are packed, yeah the tubes are packed, yeah the streets are filled with people. That's life in the big city folks, can't go anywhere these days for people. And you pay handsomly for the pleasure. I'm a pretty chilled out human being for the most part and I see no reason why commuting needs to be any more painful or tedious than the travel companies already make it.

And yet somehow, large groups of over-dressed simians manage to rile me pretty much most days, even with the anaesthetizing effects of poddy. So here are my top ten commuting tips to make life better for everyone around you.

1) Escalators are divided with an invisible line neatly down the middle, walkers on the left, standing folks on the right. DO NOT FUCKING STAND ON THE LEFT OF AN ESCALATOR. EVER. If you do, then don't look so surprised when someone tries to elbow past you. Or when one day they push you down the stairs into the wheelchair that'll be waiting for your paraplegic form. This extends to bags. If you have a giant bag, turn it sideways, stand behind it, in front of it; NOT BESIDE IT.

2) If you have managed to walk up or down that magical left hand side of the moving staircase of idiocy, when you get to the end. DONT FUCKING STOP. Really, keep walking right off the end and on to wherever you're going next. If you stop the person behind you stops. And the person behind them and them and them etc etc until everything grinds to a standstill and doesn't start again till after rush hour has finished.

3) After exiting any escalator, trainbustube door, station entrance / exit, remember that you still have somewhere to go unless you're collecting tickets. Stopping in this precise location will block the way for the people behind you. Step neatly to one side, fine a space with a little room to breath that's not in a noticeably public thoroughfare and then pull your map / mobile phone out. If you persist in obstructing the flow of progress one day you will be stamped on in a most righteous manner.

4) Whilst moving across any surface, look where you are going. That way you'll avoid bumping into people or getting run over by a bus even though you probably richly deserve it.

5) Keep your poddy or alternatively branded MP3 player to a level where if I'm sitting three seats behind you I can't actually hear the song lyrics. Especially if you're playing the kind of music that even a Capital Radio DJ would deem to be cheesy shite.

6) If you're travelling on public transport at certain times of day it's likely to be busy. It's like that every day, don't be surprised. Don't pull faces, don't make snide comments, no one cares, and no one wants to be reminded that animals on the way to a slaughter house are treated better.

7) If you're on a tube or train and it's busy, remember that the bits down the middle, between the rows of seats are often devoid of life and therefore make for additional room to stand and breathe. If you continue to cram into the gap opposite the doors and don't move down the carriage it gets really busy and it's pretty hard to get in or out easily. I promise you you won't miss your stop. I often stand in the corridor, often by myself and I've never missed a stop yet.

8) An extension of 7 is that if you do have enough brains to move down the corridor, don't stop after one step, keep those synapses flowing. Stopping so soon doesn't help. It blocks the rest of the way. And when you're there, try to minimize the amount of space you're taking up. Stand side on, everyone wants to get home and making room for one more will make someone else a little happier that they don't have to wait another ten minutes for the next every three minutes Northern line train.

9) The driver of your vehicle wants an easy a life as you and 99.99 recurring % of any delays or problems are unlikely to be their fault. Do not take your anger out on them, that's extremely pathetic and not a little cowardly. It'll also slow down yours and our journey. If you're really that pissed off with the way things are then write to your MP, the Queen, the Pope, God, Satan, Ken Livingstone, take to the streets, organise a mass stay-at-home or find out where the MD of the bus / train company lives and throw paint at their windows. Do something useful.

10) You are a complex piece or organic engineering, surrounded by many other complex pieces of organic engineering. Some of them may be broken, there's not much you can do about that, try and avoid at all possible costs. Chances are the rest just want to get to work and home again as comfortably as possible. Remember that. Do unto them as you would have done to you. Show a little respect. Smile gently. Be nice. Chill the fuck out. Be human. THINK.

Poddy's fixed now.


Watching (and crying from) Channel 4's The Not Dead

Get out here while you still can

They say you should never complain about anything you can do something about so all's good folks. Thanks for asking.

It's been a funny old week. I've gone from head in the sink, losing my beans, to being down the front at the Shepherd's Bush Empire, staring into the voluminous cleavage of some 18 year old National fan, wishing I was twenty years younger.

I'm consistently surprised by the inability of some of my colleagues to not piss all over the floor.

I love the new KFC bargain bucket ad where the mum cancels their restaurant appointment to feed her brood my favourite processed chicken dinner. It says to me: eat KFC because you're too fucking lazy to teach your kids some decent social interaction and you have no desire to put yourself through the hell you used to put your parents through when they took you to restaurants. Who says we're not getting smarter.

Listening to Neil Young: Chrome Dreams 2
Watching Black Christmas

Remember, remember, the 5th of November

Watching: V For Vendetta

It takes every day to be surviving in the city

Yesterday was one of those perfect, still autumn days: blue skies and hazy sun, crispy fresh, fire on with windows open, a final tender kiss of warmth as mother nature slips on her autumn colours. I took a few crafty pics in the changing room.

Then later that night a nice old man just down the river puts on a few fireworks for his grand-daughter.

Baby flack jackets on the merry-go-round

Patrick asked me to keep him up to date of all the movies I've been watching, as well as my blog posts, since his access to the latest Hollywood blockbusters and various points of call on the old interwebare going to be somewhat limited for a while. Of course, as yet, I haven't.

So here's a stone and a couple of feathered flying things:

Of the numerous flicks I've sat through recently there are 5 that have lodged themselves between the holes that is the colander of my memory: Letters From Iwo Jima, Cashback, United 93, Joe Strummer - The Future Is Unwritten and Mr Brooks.

For me, the pivotal scene in Letters is the moment when one of the Japanese commanders translates a letter, found on a dying American prisoner, to his men. The letter is from the soldier's mother: details of home, how much she misses him. It is no different from the letters from their own mothers, read by the Japanese soldiers abandoned by a war machine indifferent to their suffering. War is a horror created by monsters and fought by men, some of whom become monsters themselves, but most of whom just don't want to die, no matter what side they're on. Letters portrays each one individual, unique, battered down to a number, a figure, a statistic; it's a sad and beautiful meditation on that theme.

The Cashback flashback (I had to) where the au pair walks up the stairs has branded itself in my brain as giving us one of the most beautiful naked female bodies ever committed to celluloid. And I'd like to think I'm reasonably qualified to pass that judgement. Cashback is one of those rare beasts: a romantic comedy that's both genuinely, but not saccharine, romantic and funny. At times screamingly funny. It's a British movie that doesn't suck, it's quirky in a good way, intelligent, original, joyful, playful, sexy. It doesn't yet have a UK release date, which goes to prove, as far as I'm concerned, that most of the people who make decisions in the film industry, rather than movies, are imbeciles.

I wasn't sure about watching United 93. I wasn't sure if I wanted to put myself through that particular ride. one of the things I wasn't expecting was that the flight itself takes up only the last third of the film. The rest crosses between pre-flight routine and the air traffic control towers gradually realising they're losing planes and then one of them flies into the World Trade Center. With the outcome seared into the collective consciousness of the twenty first century, the film avoids subjectivity as much as possible, instead focusing on ordinary people reacting to one of the most fucked up situations you could ever imagine being in. You could call it a testament to the strength of the human spirit (on both sides) whilst the mechanisms designed to protect failed so dramatically around them. That the families of those who died provided the stories, and that some of those who stood in the control towers that day re-took their places is testament enough.

I wondered afterwards if those who took the planes that day were to know how many would die as a result of their actions, not in the towers but the eventual response, the ignition of a spark of hatred across the globe, the mass slaughter of innocents of all religions, would they still have done it.

What frightens me most is the fear that they would.

Of these five movies, all but Mr Brooks, I would say, have a strong human heart beating at their centre. That's something that comes pouring out of The Future Is Unwritten. That and the fact that Joe Strummer could also be a bit of a shit sometimes. Just like us all, heh? Perhaps all we are is the way others remember us, and Strummer, both good and bad, is remembered with warmth by those who tells his story around the camp fire. A simple story of a man who loved music, who believed in the human spirit, who failed as he succeeded, who stuck to his beliefs and who's band wrote themselves into the history books for almost all the right reasons.

Kevin Costner as the family man serial killer, Mr Brooks, with William Hurt as his evil conscience incarnate, dark and intelligent movie, blackly funny, a few nice stings in an original tale, Demi Moore so good, I thought she was Jennifer Connelly. So of course it seemed to disappear without trace in the British cinemas. Go figure.

Of the rest well:

Grandma's Boy from Adam Sandler's production company is a very funny movie about geeks and weed. That's all you need to know.

Disturbia is Rear Window for MySpace.

Vacancy was twenty great minutes stretched beyond endurance.

Fast Food Nation was all the ideas in the book somewhat unsuccessfully fictionalised. It is not an Avril Lavigne break-out movie.

Control was good but not as good as it's been made out to have been. If they ever make a movie about Sandy Denny then Samantha Morton is the shoe in for the lead.

Britannia Hospital is as accurate today as it was back then, maybe more so.

Knocked Up is weirdly funny and painfully truthful at times.

Ratatouille is sweet but not as funny as The Incredibles.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - The Beginning is basically a remake of the remake of the original and about as pointless an exercise in bland time-wasting mediocrity as ever there was. And that's with a finger on the fast-forward.

So there you have it.


I really quite like the two grey badger stripes that grow either side of my chin when I haven't shaved for a few days. I pretend I'm becoming distinguished...

Listening to Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros: Streetcore

You can never give, the finger to the blind

It's been over a week now since I returned from Rome. Outside the rain mists the windows, and rustles like tissue paper on my roof.

DSpace meetings are made all the more enjoyable by the unusually high availability of good people to talk to. And the locations so far haven't hurt: Cambridge, Bergen, San Antonio, Rome (I'll reserve judgement for next year' s Southampton meeting...). They're the kinds of meetings where you'll meet someone who goes out on tequila nights with your colleagues and who was at the same University as you at the same time, even at some of the same gigs. As Steven Wright once said: it's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it. They also fill me with renewed enthusiasm for what I do until I return to my desk with the crashing realisation that reality is exactly that, and not some terrible dream I've yet to wake from.

I liked Rome very much. It has a vibrant madness to it that somehow complements the space and landscape littered with ancient monuments and ruins. I think most of all I enjoyed being away for a few days. I took some pictures.

There's been so much movement this year. Pat's now working in China, Neil moved to Winchester, Evil walked ("behind me"), Jules went home to Australia, Hazel's the other side of town, Grace and Jono are missed at the office and sister no 1 is off to Washington soon for 3 years.
I made myself a Halloween jack o' lantern yesterday.



Listening to: The Best of Luna

'It'll be all right,'

Julia's gentleness makes it worse, 'in the end, Jace.'
'It doesn't feel very all right.'
'That's because it's not the end.'

Reading: David Mitchell - Black Swan Green

I'm A Cactus Trying To Be A Canoe

Scribbled on the way home from Rome, Friday 19th October 2007:

According to the drop-down screen above me, I'm currently 142km from London and it's -40 degrees outside. Somewhere to my left the English coast is frosted with an orange glow, like some bad cocktail in an even worse cocktail bar. There are people I know, or at least used to know down there in the haze. This is as close as I get to wondering what they're up to. The moon has become one of those orange jellied fruit segments that occasionally accompanied a guest to one of Mum and Dad's dinner parties, giving me a taste for over-priced fruit pastilles.

The flight skips straight up to Heathrow past Gatwick. I do wonder if Annie might have glanced up at some distant lights in the sky, that from the ground represent my and my fellow passenger's existence at this moment in time.

My first words off the plane are: "Bollocks, it's cold." I suppose I'm in Terminal 2 but I'm not 100% sure. For the second time this year a customs officer tells me off for standing in the wrong place at passport control. Note to self: front of desk, not side. I just want out now so I can search for a non-existent working beverage dispensing unit. I have a craving for a well known brand of sugary carbonated caffeine drink. No luck.

Back in baggage reclaim there's a no photography sign immediately above an upturned blue suitcase lying dormant on a dead conveyor. It would have made a great photograph. But I suspect that even this late there are too many eyes watching even the deadest of spaces. That's probably what'll be left after whatever apocalypse claims us. A lone suitcase in an airport and yet still the unwatched blinking red eye of a thousand CCTV cameras, just waiting till the tape finally runs out.

Some prick spends 5 minutes holding up the bus as he struggles to find his pockets, let alone the change that isn't in them. I can smell the rancid booze he oozes from the back of the bus. Apparently it's not just the illegal drugs that are bad for us now. I turn to catch a Dolce and Gabbana poster at the stop. I last saw it 8 hours ago overlooking the Trevi Fountain.

Suddenly I don't think I'm ready to be home just yet.


Listening: R.E.M. - Live
Watching: Californication

Thistles And Thorns

I spent part of this afternoon uploading the photos off my phone and on to the mac. Here's a few:










Tunes: Sandy Denny: Live At The BBC

The Party's Done, The Cake's All Gone, The Plates Are Clean

I did something last night I haven't done for a very long time; no, not that, nor that, or that.

Last night I went to sleep knowing that when I woke it would be to a clean and tidy boat with no signs of ongoing building work and with all this year's work tasks ticked.

It's been a long and often painful summer. And for all the parties I've missed, the folks I haven't seen, the moments of madness I've messed with and the emails I haven't read, let alone responded to, I'm chuffed as nuts for what I've achieved. When I first moved on I had an image of what I thought Chuffy could look like. And as close as is humanly possible I've brought that picture to life.

OK, so rebuilding the sofa had to happen, and I really didn't want to have to rebuild the underbed storage at the back of the boat but both gave me the opportunity to make things work as I wanted them to. But it was completing the skylight that really tied the room together.

Of course if I'd known when I moved on what I know now I would have taken two months to gut Chuffy and do all this work before I even considered bringing a wash bag over. Working inside the boat, especially in this summer's ongoing downpour necessitates turning all available space into either a workshop or a storage area leaving little for living. Ironically I don't find it easy existing in the chaos I need to create to do this work. For almost three months now I've been immersed in a manic desperation to finish before my sanity truly gave out ( and it was too close for comfort).

Don't get me wrong, the first couple of months were great: I love crafting my home. There's little more satisfying than standing back and looking at a good job well done; knowing that it was my own graft, my own blood, sweat and occasionally tears that made it happen. All that male-romantic guff about building things, especially boats, out of wood is so true. I'd do this for a living if I could (although I'm not sure my skills are quite up to scratch yet and I still need a good band-saw to get those perfect finishes).

As the sun came and threatened to go, as all the promised entertaining vanished and as every non-working hour was hoovered up with work, my patience started wearing rice-paper thin. I've been in a relatively bad mood since the beginning of the month as all I've wanted is my home back. And I've been absolutely knackered since about mid-July.

But now it's done. Today is the first day (after spending all day yesterday cleaning up) that I've been able to enjoy the fruit of my labours. Chuffy's been transformed and I feel as if I can finally emerge butterfly-like from this cocoon of cross-head screws and silicon sealant.

At the final count I've spent probably well over a grand on tools and parts, amassed an incredible collection of screw drivers, gone through three tins of varnish, three or four of paint, about twenty paintbrushes and no end of bruises, cuts, scrapes and aching body parts. Along the way the professor, sisters 1 & 2 and evil M have all contributed in some way and their assistance does not go unappreciated; thank you.

As far as I'm concerned it was worth it.



Tunes: Okkervil River: The Stage Names

Snack Attack

Boy Is Accused Of Sausage Assault has to be one of my favourite headlines in recent (or only) memory. As a counterpoint to the news about Philip Lawrence's killer it's both bizarre and depressing and yet it's also a wonderfully absurd low in the reporting of the ever declining state of Britain's youth. The darker half of my brain can't get over the image of a world where 'deviant hoodies' roam the streets with handfuls of pork snacks.

It's not exactly the Blade Runner boxed set but I'm looking forward to this:




Tunes: James Taylor: James Taylor

I Made This

Once upon a different life ago I held on to a deluded dream of being a film maker. I only say deluded because I wasn't close to being the kind of person I would have needed to be to get through. I enjoyed the time I spent dabbling, it was fun making the films we did make and of all of them I'm most proud of a promo we did for the band Snuff.

We'd been in touch with them about using some songs of theirs and they needed a video for their cover of The Four Tops' Standing In The Shadows Of Love. They gave us £500. £100 went on lights and tape, £300 on hiring an AVID suite and we walked of with the last £100. £25 each for three days work. I managed to blag some digitisation off an old Uni buddy I'd luckily bumped into a few weeks before. Probably the only good bit of producing I ever did.

We shot on Super-VHS, a day at a rehearsal studio and an evening at the Dublin Castle, a gate-crash gig they put on for us to get more footage. Then 2 days editing. We'd been in contact with an editor who had a friend with an AVID at home who was away for the weekend which is why it was so cheap. I think she was working for nothing.

I would have liked to have become an editor.

The band were great guys, the experience was a hoot and seeing 30 seconds of the video on The Chart Show was the highlight of everything we'd done. Hollywood might have been beckoning but the bank manager was waving harder.

I wasn't expecting to find it. I was looking to see if there was any live footage of the band. But there it was.



There's a cracking version of Soul Limbo on the EP.


Tunes: Iron Maiden: A Matter Of Life And Death

Some Time Later

Remember that pic of the sofa I posted a while back.

It now looks like this:





Tunes: Tom Petty: Damn The Torpedos

Another Coincidental Coincidence

Yesterday I was reading an article about how many public clocks in the country are no longer maintained. It included the quote about how even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Yesterday evening I caught the end of a movie that quoted the same line.

It's all getting far too spooky.


Tunes: Broken Social Scene: You Forgot It In People

Six Degrees of Baloney

Since I share my birthday with Jean Reno, I decide to watch Leon again last week. I was discussing it with Mike as we walked into Kingston on Sunday and who should be staring out at us from an advertising board in the window of John Lewis but...

You've guessed it, Jean Reno. Leon also stars a young Nathalie Portman whose character, Mathilda, watches Transformers a fair bit. The day before I watched Leon I went to see...

You've guessed it, Transformers. Before the movie we were discussing some of the inconsistencies in the plot arc between the first and last three instalments of the Star Wars trilogy, one of which was how Luke and Leia remember their mother played by...

You've guessed it, Nathalie Portman. In Leon Nathalie Portman's family are wiped out by bad cop Stansfield played by Gary Oldman, who (co-incidentally) shared a screen with Harrison Ford in Airforce One. Harrison Ford also plays Han Solo in the last three Star Wars movies and ends up with maternally challenged Leia in Episode 6. Oldman also appears in the Harry Potter movies, the latest of which, The Order Of The Phoenix, I went to see in Amsterdam as my birthday movie.

A birthday I share with...

You've guessed it, Jean Reno.

As an afterthought and for the sake of the maths which could still be wrong it's worth noting that Leon was directed by Luc Besson who also made a movie about Joan of Arc who was also the subject of George Bernard Shaw's play, Saint Joan, which we went to see at the National for my Mum's birthday. Joan is played by Ann-Marie Duff who found fame with the tv show Shameless alongside James McAvoy who escapes Idi Amin's clutches in the Last King Of Scotland during the siege of Entebbe which is where my Mum used to live.

Spooky huh!

Try it out for yourself and see what baloney you can come up with.


Tunes: Snuff: Six Of One, Half A Dozen Of The Other

Run To The Hills

Yesterday I walked past a guy with a bad limp and a walking stick wearing one of those clever 'bomb squad - if you see me running try to keep up t-shirts'.

Happy New Year

According to Wikipedia I share my birthday with Kate Bush, Jean Reno, Richard Linklater and Emily Bronte. Also with Arnie and the drummer from the Manics but let's leave those two for a moment. Joe Shuster, the artist who helped create Superman died on 30th July 1992. Other birthdeaths include Otto Von Bismarck, Claudette Colbert, Ingmar Bergman and potentially Jimmy Hoffa who disappeared on the day, 1975.

I'm the same age as Christopher Nolan, the director of Memento and Batman Begins. I wonder if he enjoyed the day as much as I did.

I've learnt that I have an adverbial disorder, it's not serious, it's quite silly really. Apparently the only cure involves being pointed and laughed at. Life's harsh sometimes.

People say that Amsterdam is full of beautiful houseboats. That's not entirely true. There are some really crappy ones out there.

Good festivals have the best organisers...

Tunes: Maximo Park: Our Earthly Pleasures

I Call This Bridge And Boat Under Moon (Although I Don't Know Why)

Tunes: Fairport Convention: Liege And Lief

Your Insides Will Glow

I know I should have added some more Glastonbury news, but somewhere along the way this happened.

My Glastonbury pics are up here though. More on everything once I get over being back at work.


Tunes: The Broken Family band: Hello Love

We're All Fucked Up On The Booze And the Drugs

Everything hurts, I have a cold, an allergy to movement, I've slept for a day, I think I still have mud under my eyelids and even simple tasks are taking a monumental effort. Guess I'm back from Glastonbury then. More to follow...


Tunes: The Broken Family Band: Balls

Land Of Hope and Glory

Mike was in full political flow, charting the decline of western civilisation and portending a none too happy future when Ian Dury's Fucking Aida came on. It's very hard to take anything seriously when one of England's greatest poets and his Blockheads are shouting "Fucking Aida" repeatedly over a drunken music hall stomp. Sometimes laughter is the only sense there is.

I had this wonderful image of the country sinking into the sea, the last bowler hatted English gentleman standing stiffly to attention, briefcase, umbrella and rolled up copy of the times gradually disappearing from view (Cap'n Jack Sparrow style) whilst Fucking Aida plays in the background.


Tunes: Ian Dury And The Blockheads: Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll

I Wish I Was Bulletproof

A couple of fragments of conversation from last night.

Franklin was wrong. The only thing that's certain in life is death. Not everyone gets to pay tax. If, as they say, you see your life flash before you as you die then shouldn't it be the best movie you've ever seen. Something you'd want to sit through one last time. Ups and downs, thrills and spills, love and laughter, sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll. Wouldn't it just suck if it turned out to be some terrible Ingmar Bergman movie.

In a world of shrinking inhabitable land mass and rapidly increasing population with all the necessary output to look after them, will the world one day just fill up. It would be like someone turns a corner and that'll be it. Population gridlock. Everyone will just be stuck where they are, unable to move. Neither Starfleet nor Dr Who will be able to come and save us. There'll be a big sign up in space saying "Sorry, this planet is now full, please use another planet."

Tunes: Radiohead: The Bends

Is There One Last Untamed Untouched Part

It's funny what finally breaks people. Not that long ago, half an hour or so as it happens, I was sitting on Mike's boat pretty much enjoying the self-conscious quirkiness of 'A Cock And Bull Story' when this sound broke our concentration. And the movie does take a little concentration. It took a few moments to figure out that this was whom we shall call Neighbour L. Now I know she was singing. In her world at least. In truth my toes started curling and I began to feel my tuna avocado dinner return somewhat unwanted. Certainly what notes were appearing haven't been invented yet. No words, just a semi-lupine outpouring at top volume. Think of a cat trying to yowl opera whilst being put through a barbed wire mangle.

Suddenly from the other side, he whom shall be referred to as Neighbour S, was taken to an uncharacteristic bout of vocal abuse. Something along the lines of: "Just shut the fuck up will you..." repeated until the noise abated. Neighbour S is one of those folks for whom the phrase 'wouldn't say boo to a goose' might have been invented (although I don't know anyone who's ever said boo to a goose. I've had plenty of opportunities and never once even thought of it). Apparently the vocal callisthenics added just a touch too much atmosphere to the horror movie he was watching and he, for want of a better word, snapped.

I've been listening to a LOT of The Rainmakers recently. A few minutes surfing this lunchtime revealed a bunch of their videos and some live performances on You Tube. This is one of my favourite tunes from their penultimate, and sadly only fourth, studio album. It's not exactly "I wish I cared but I don't know how" but I guess even Bob had to fall in love eventually. Damn they made some shitty videos!





Tunes: The Rainmakers: Flirting With The Universe

Smoke From The Water

Trying out my new camera, a nice deal on eBay. That is until I saw a better camera for less in the PC World sale this morning. Oh well. Looks ok so far. See if stands the test of the Glastonbury fields.

Back In The Saddle

I've just added my fourth blog to my roster, somewhat worrying considering I've been so poor at updating this one of late. A couple of weeks ago I dipped my toe back into Londonist waters and now I have my very own work blog so you can keep up to date with all the fun things I do here at the office. "Woo hoo" I hear you all scream. Remember to set all your bookmarks or RSS feeds if you're more of a web 2.0 kinda reader.

Added to 'Ducks and my somewhat poorly maintained music blog, Hyena, that's a lot of writing to keep up with. Londonist I'm going to continue to dip into for the moment to see how thing's progress. The OR blog at least I can do at work. Ducks and Hyena I'm going to try to concentrate on a little more from now on. I might even get around to putting some more of my pictures up on flickr, especially now I've replaced my malfunctioning digital camera.

What's So Funny 'Bout Peace, Love And Understanding?

The American fundementalist preacher, the Rev Jerry Falwell died this week. To many this was a good thing. I'll leave my thoughts on the matter to two quotes. The first were words spoken by Falwell about the attacks on the World Trade Center, a few days after the event. The second quote is attributed to some guy called Jesus.

The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays, and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU [American Civil Liberties Union], People for the American Way - all of them who have tried to secularise America - I point the finger in their face and say: 'You helped this happen'.

Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they shall possess the earth.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice,
for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure of heart,
for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are they who suffer persecution for justice sake,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Tunes: Dinosaur Jr: Beyond

Isn't It A Little Late To Be Trimming The Verge?

I'm pretty much knackered by the time I hit Kingston bridge. That means I've been running for about three minutes now. I pass a couple of runners going the other way, bounding along like two legged antelopes, sleek and shiny in their body-hugging jogging suits and hardly a breath to be heard. I'm in an old Gap top and my swimming shorts, I sound like a dying Rhino.

No comments from the misery of emo-kids huddled at the end of Canbury Gardens, that's a good thing. I'm more stumbling than running at this point, my legs hurt like hell and I'm seriously regretting doing this tonight. Somewhere along the river path the background hum of human noise drops away, I lose all feeling in my legs and I hit my pace. It's not particularly fast but it's steady and I don't get too upset when those athletalopes goes springing past. The river reflects a peach and purple shimmer.

I realise I'm just about keeping pace with a small boat. To compensate for the bends in the path I speed up. I don't want to. It's neck and neck and I wonder whether I'd be impressed if I knew just how slowly it's going. We reach the foot bridge together; I'm going way too fast, there's still a mile and three quarters to go.

I try to slow down when I hit the pavement. Doesn't work. I almost fall over. I've forgotten whether I'm breathing or not. I cannot think of a single good reason as to why I put myself through this. And then there's nothing but keeping my legs moving. My head clears. All the unaswerable questions part in a Moses like trance. This is what I love most about running.

Passing the school reminds me I'm on the last stretch and I decide to stretch my legs. This is my second stupid idea of the evening. I'm keeping the same pace with a longer stride. This is not fun. I want to slow down, I'd rather stop.

Every time I see the railway bridge I get one of those extending corridor movie moments. I think no matter how far I run it will remain the same. Those last few hundred yards are the bitch of the bunch.

One last turn into the yard and drop into a walk. Three and a half miles of exertion career straight into the back of me like a car in a traffic safety commercial. I have a serious adrenaline hit and scare the shit out of Denise as she gets back from the allotment. My face burns with blood, my back is soaking, I can hardly breathe. I have three blisters, each on top of the other and I reek. I'm grinning like the idiot I am. I'll be doing it all again tomorrow morning.


Tunes: Brett Anderson: Brett Anderson

I Closed My Eyes And I Slipped Away

Anyone who's spent more than about five seconds in my company will know that I think Boston's More Than A feeling is possibly the greatest song ever written. To be honest I don't know much about the band, I only own the one album and I didn't even know Brad Delp was the singer (since I never read the liner notes) until I read of his suicide last week. From what I've read he suffered from depression and extremely low self esteem and yet was obviously considered by pretty much everyone who knew or worked with him to be a really nice guy.

That really fucking sucks.

So here's a reminder of why the song is so damn good and what a great vocalist Delp was.




Tunes: Kings X: Gretchen Goes To Nebraska

Pulling Teeth

I had a tooth pulled yesterday. One of the rear left molars on the top. Not one I'm going to miss. Three anesthetics meant there was no pain and everything seems to be healing nicely, thank you for asking. But it's a horrible experience. If I didn't hate dentists so much I probably wouldn't have had to be there but there you go. Lesson learned.

The moment that did it for me was when he snapped the tooth to be able to pull it out, breaking the roots at the tip. It's not the feeling of pressure that's being exerted within your jaw that makes the toes curl but that sharp, crunching sound that echoes around inside your head. You don't feel a thing but you know damn well what it would have felt like had the nice dentist not pumped your jaw full of drugs so you can spend the next few hours drooling out the side of your mouth like a constipated muppet. I didn't mind so much when I could feel him pulling bits of root out but every time he tried to gain some leverage using the rest of my jaw as a pivot all I could think of was to hope that he didn't slip and take a few more out in the process.

It was a good excuse to spend the morning sitting out in the sunshine on Chuffy's nose. Something I haven't done since October of last year. It reminded me after almost getting squashed last week that there are some very good things about living on boats and they're all just about to roll back in. The warm weather's on its way, the geese are getting frisky - never a good thing unless you get off on constant honking - and my tulips (from Amsterdam) are coming through.


Tunes: Rush: Rush In Rio

More From Yesterday

Breaking News - Holy Shit!

High tide...

Rubbish Photo Of The Lunar Eclipse

I hereby stake my right as a blogger to clog up the www with rubbish photos of Saturday's lunar eclipse. It looked a lot better in the flesh.

I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the pancake inducing effects of the river at the moment.

Getting Squashed

It's fucking hairy out there tonight. There's a shitload of water coming down the Thames and we're rocking about all over the place. You don't often see waves rolling past your bedroom window but tonight's one of those nights when you wish you hadn't seen Titanic. If just for that nauseous song.

Simon's boat Rhiannon has been pushing up against me and crushing me up against the pontoon. Wayne, Mo and I were out tonight trying to retie her guy ropes to pull her away. Mo and I could hardly push the two boats apart the current's so strong.

Hopefully another dry day tomorrow will ease things up a bit. Ah the joys of boat living ladies and gentlemen. Some days I envy you all and your sturdy living environments.