Blah Blah Flowers

Is Popular Science a magazine aimed at kids? Only call me an old fuddy-duddy but a magazine that has a podcast that 'comes from the moon' and is only around seven or eight minutes long when you deduct the crap from the beginning and end about it being 'from the moon', that's got to be for the more credulous seven year olds, right?

Labels: podcasts, science

In what looks suspiciously like throwing in a headline-grabbing element to spice up an otherwise dull plot, a film which contains the assassination of George Dubya Bush will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival next month.

Labels: George 'Shrubya' Bush, movies, United States

Tom Cruise is Nuts. [via Linkbunnies] Has anyone seen his baby yet, or did Katie have to act as though she loved him with a cushion up her blouse?

Labels: Scientology, Tom Cruise

I'm am the back. And hello to my father if he really is reading this now rather than just winding me up.

If you're reading this in the year 2525, if man is still alive, can you come back in your time machine? I need to go further back in time, about three years or so:

Q A lot of the consequences you mentioned for pulling out seem like maybe they never would have been there if we hadn't gone in. How do you square all of that?

THE PRESIDENT You know, I've heard this theory about everything was just fine until we arrived, and kind of "we're going to stir up the hornet's nest" theory. It just doesn't hold water, as far as I'm concerned. The terrorists attacked us and killed 3,000 of our citizens before we started the freedom agenda in the Middle East.

Q What did Iraq have to do with that?

THE PRESIDENT: What did Iraq have to do with what?

Q The attack on the World Trade Center?

THE PRESIDENT: Nothing... Nobody has ever suggested that the attacks of September the 11th were ordered by Iraq. I have suggested, however, that resentment and the lack of hope create the breeding grounds for terrorists who are willing to use suiciders to kill to achieve an objective.

Remember, nearly seven out of ten Americans have been mis-led by their Government and that Bill O'Reilly wanker.

'[R]esentment and the lack of hope create the breeding grounds for terrorists who are willing to use suiciders to kill to achieve an objective', strange how he didn't add 'this is why we unquestioningly support Israel in their attempts to kill all of them' afterwards.

Labels: Fox, George 'Shrubya' Bush, Iraq, The War Against Terror, United States

Flowers on Little Russell Street
Originally uploaded by Loz Flowers.

Going down to my parents this evening for birthday fun. Back tomorrow evening...

Labels: Flickr, London

The Daily Mail issues a hilarious warning to parents on the dangers of their kids discovering Emo.

The Emos - short for Emotional - regard themselves as a cool, young sub-set of the Goths. Although the look is similar, the point of distinction, frightening for schools and parents, is a celebration of self harm... One governor of a famous boarding school told me that it was as serious a problem as binge drinking, but rarely discussed for fear of encouraging more girls to do it... The internet has many sites dedicated to Emo fashion (dyed black hair brushed over your face, layering, black, black, black), Emo bands (Green Day, My Chemical Romance), Emo conversation (sighing, wailing, poetry). (Emphasis mine)

Lawks! Who will save our kids from this sighing/wailing poetry menace?

The androgynous nature of the Goths is appealing to the young because it is sexually unthreatening. Teenage girls are frightened of manliness: they like boys who look like girls. Kate Moss, the girl who never grows old, understands youthful taste completely. There is also a deadly glamour about the Goths. The word femme-fatale is Goth based. Many of the alluring women of our time - Nigella Lawson, Debbie Harry, Chrissie Hynde, Sophie Ellis Bextor, Lily Allen - have a touch of the Goth about them.

Nigella Lawson am emo? Sophie Ellis Bexter?

They have a sophistication and depth lacking in the blonde, bouncy chav faces which dominate our television screens and nightclubs.

Grrr...

Although Goths are from the same family tree as punks, they are a lot less fun to be with. While I loved punk for its energy, Goths were too bloodless to lift a finger. One of the most annoying characteristics of teenagers is their refusal to open their curtains. Their world is dark and airless. If this environment is coupled with the psychological traits of self-pity, introspection, self-dramatisation and hormone imbalance, you have a fully-fledged Emo, even without the small Tshirt and black hair. The wondrous thing about being an adult is that you have so much more to worry about that you stop striking poses and get on with it... What worries me is that teenagers are less equipped to manage strong emotions and a cult of suicide could have real and horrible consequences.

It is irresponsible for the fashion and music cultures to encourage it. If you want retro style, I recommend Ian Dury's song Reasons To Be Cheerful.

I think it's more irresponsible for the Daily Mail to encourage their readers to believe their world is a dark and hateful place. What's the proportion of 'OMG we're all going to die!!1!' stories to 'why don't we chill out and relax' stories in the Daily Mail? It's the Mail that's anti-life, not emo.

Labels: Daily Mail, Emo, Goths

Charmless bigots Christian Voice claim England 'winning' the test series against Pakistan was all thanks to God.

The astonishing result of the fourth and final Test Match between England and Pakistan came after an extraordinary prayer from the leader of a prominent Christian group (i.e. Stephen Green, committing the sin of Pride on behalf of Christian Voice) that God would 'judge' the Pakistan team for their attempt to promote Islam during the Test series. During the first Test Match, much was made of the communal Islamic faith of the Pakistan team... The National Director of Christian Voice, prayed that God would judge the Pakistan team for their promotion of Islam in this Christian nation. Incredibly, Pakistan lost the second Test by an innings and promptly lost the Third as well.

Labels: Christian Voice, cricket, Fundamentalists- Christian

Mel Gibson Apologizes, Says He Meant to Condemn Gays not Jews. [via Fake Gay News]

Labels: homophobia, humour

At the risk of turning this into a blog where I just whine about stupid columnists, Goddamn Lowri Turner. You remember Lowri Turner right? Remember? Well, this week Mrs 'I don't have anything against gays but' turns her keen insight on immigration.

To the middle classes, immigration from countries that used to be part of the Soviet Union is a win-win situation. After years of being held to ransom by surly builders and overpaid nannies, they are back in the driving seat. Hand Vladimir a meagre bundle of cash and those gutters are fixed in a jiffy with no mention of a cup of tea or going home at 3. Vonya will be just as willing to come and live in your house and look after your kids for a pittance.

It's not often that you get someone who isn't living in the nineteenth century being so open about taking such advantage of other people.

For company bosses too, this new pool of highly motivated, skilled workers is a godsend. Well, if you were a boss would you rather employ some spotty British youth or Vicky Pollard type, or a young man from Estonia with a mother and four sisters to support back home? The latter obviously.

Everyone under 23 is a chav, obviously.

Plus, we're told, these people bring a taste of a different culture with them. This translates, if you are one of the chattering classes, into a fabulous little ethnic bistro round the corner. I have a Polish deli not far from me and a Russian restaurant and Bulgarian and Hungarian eateries can't be far behind.

"And dahling, they all talk in that funny noise that almost sounds like talking and if you throw them a quid they'll do one of their funny little dances for you! They really are a hoot! Not like the girl we had to let go last week, we gave her her monthly wages and she didn't have the common decency to prostrate herself at our feet in thankfulness! Honestly, the ingratitude!"

The result is a middle-class consensus that immigration is good for the country. I am part of this consensus. I think immigration is a good thing. Still, I hosted a radio phone-in this week and I heard a rather different story from a section of the population who are being hushed-up because their views and experiences do not fit the official response. They are what we used to call the working classes, but now we're too embarrassed to call them anything really.

Now, see that bit up there where Lowri says: immigration is good for the country and I am part of this consensus? I believe that this is a lie. I am led to this conclusion because Lowri spends the rest of the article repeating the usual claptrap racists spout through a variety of third persons without any attempt to counter it.

I talked to builders who told me of some Eastern European counterparts driving untaxed vans, living 10 to a house and doing work for cash at prices that they, as men with families to support and mortgages to pay, couldn't hope to match. Some of this is sour grapes, of course. Our builders have long preferred cash and are not known for being eager beavers.

Oh, you didn't accidentally refer to them as 'the so-called working classes' in their hearing did you?

However, it is not just building jobs that those from the former Soviet Union are mopping up. Factory and agricultural work, as well as care jobs are all popular. The obvious argument is that these are all jobs that we don't want to do. They are poorly paid and low status. But, rather than accept these facts and just hire in a more desperate lot of foreign workers, shouldn't we be thinking perhaps about improving the pay and conditions so they are fit for our own people? As one caller said to me this week, 'The British working classes are being sold down the river.'

Another caller had an astute prediction. He said, 'Just you wait until it's middle-class jobs that are being taken, see how you like it.'

And it's already starting. I spoke to a dentist who was incandescent that the Government has just hired in Eastern European dentists to solve the NHS dental shortage. We already have lots of foreign doctors and nurses, but it will be interesting to see how the middle classes react when they are followed by accountants, lawyers and management consultants. They'll be choking on their borscht and blinis then.

Accusations of racism are easy to sling at those who have concerns about the influx of foreign workers. However, I also heard worrying stories this week of a brand of old-fashioned racism that is being imported with some of those who are arriving here.

If you were shut behind the Iron Curtain for a lifetime, it is unlikely that your views on race are enlightened. Some of those travelling here from tiny villages have never seen a black person. I was told of one university lecturer from Khazakhstan who came home to her UK landlady every night and wept because she was so horrified by the brown skins she encountered.

That's not actually racism Lowri. I would hazard a guess it's 'culture shock'. My Concise Oxford defines racism as 'a belief in the superiority of a particular race; prejudice based on this'. Now maybe your Kazakhstani was weeping because the inhabitants of those brown skins weren't all strung up at the nearest lamp-post but so far it's only you and your phone-in friends who are the closest to expressing a belief that they're in the master-race.

As one black caller told me,

"Ooh, ooh, look! 'Black person', 'black person'! I must be right, I've got a black person backing me up!"

As one black caller told me, 'I grew up with racism and things had got better. Now it's like going back 20 years.' One cabbie recounted how he hears the N-word used in the back of his cab now and another woman reported a squat opposite her house populated by Russians, some of whom paraded about wearing Nazi insignia. It sounds unbelievable, but she was adamant.

So she must be right.

Now, none of this is an argument against immigration. We are a nation whose wealth is founded on foreign labour. Our continued prosperity depends upon it. Besides, with so many of us opting these days to retire to Spain, we can hardly moan when others want to come here. However, not listening to certain opinions and experiences because they are uncomfortable and unfashionable is simply wrong.

However, listening to people when they're full of shit isn't exactly a prescription for mental health either.

Labels: immigration, journalists, Lowri Turner, racism

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four.

It takes two people to make a marriage, so what's his wife been up to.

In which I am airbrushed to absolutely no avail ; Liz Jones's Diary - Despite the fact that I have been married for three years, I still treat every night like a first date, which is exhausting
Daily Mail (London); Jul 30, 2006; LIZ JONES; p. 74

Hmm. So, last Saturday night, I went into the bedroom wearing only my Hanro boy pants and matching vest. He was already in bed, reading. You have to bear in mind that during the day I had endured a full leg wax and Brazilian bikini wax (it is slightly surreal being asked where I am going on holiday by the lovely young therapist while both feet are in the air, my arms clasped behind my knees, and she delves around in the place where any normal person would be wearing knickers), followed by a leg cleanse, which means they are exfoliated and brushed with sticks and then wrapped in hot towels.

In the afternoon, back home, I had a rose otto oil bath (the damask petals were harvested in Nepal; I think that's quite important) and then, still damp, massaged in a copious amount of Ren body oil; worked something I think is usually meant for horses' hooves into my toenails, before spraying myself from head to toe with Airbrush in a Can fake tan. My roots had been retouched the day before by Louise Galvin at her salon in the West End the look we have been trying to achieve is 'virgin hair', ie, that doesn't look dyed.

(Every hairdresser I have ever met always says to me accusingly, 'You haven't been dyeing it yourself at home, have you?' In much the same way every beauty therapist always chirrups, 'The hairs are awfully short. You haven't been shaving, have you?' I always deny both accusations vigorously.) Anyway, suffice to say I was honed, oiled, bronzed, and freakishly hairless.

I stepped out of my boy pants. I climbed into bed. My husband did not even look up.

It has been 18 days since we last had sex. Now, lots of women might say crossly, Why don't you initiate it for a change? What red- blooded male would be able to resist?

But, beyond the aforementioned preparations to make myself alluring and dewy, I don't think I could ever be that forward. I have never believed that I am attractive to men (I have accumulated lots of evidence to support this thesis; oh, if only I had more space) and so, despite the fact that I have been married for three years, four in October, I still treat every night like a first date, which is exhausting, and frequently a complete waste of time.

And so, this morning, I asked my husband if he still fancies me.

'Umm.'

'What do you mean, umm? Do you have to think about it?' 'I have to say, you are really sweet.'

'Sweet! Sweet! That's a horrid thing to say. And what do you mean, "I have to say" Does that mean that, despite everything, against all the odds, I am sweet?'

'Oh, I don't know,' he said, looking as exhausted as if he had been down a mine all day. 'I think we have a spiritual connection, we must have, otherwise what on earth is keeping us together?'

'Well,' I said indignantly. 'My beauty, kindness, patience, the fact you love me'

'OK, that too,' he said unconvincingly. 'I also think that, in a past life, I was your son.'

So. We don't have sex because he thinks I'm his mummy.

Emine came round today (my husband had gone missing for three hours, his phone switched off. I can't believe I am married and still get 'Sorry, the number you are calling is not available') and over a glass of wine in the garden I told her all of the above, adding that, in his defence, he has been trying to be nice by emptying the dishwasher.

'Do you think he is being nice because he is seeing someone else?' she asked me bluntly. 'Maybe that's why he doesn't have sex with you. You know I think he's clever and good looking and funny, but he is still so immature. He doesn't know what he wants. He still has all these fantasies he wants to act out. I really think you should chuck him out for a while to fend for himself.

He has to spring away on a rubber band and feel the attraction, remember.'

'But I'm worried he won't come back!' I wailed.

Ewwww. Much wrongness.


'So, you had the best sex of your life while you were in India?' I said calmly. 'You preferred having sex with those women to having sex with me' ; Liz Jones's diary: In which I discover a loaded email

The Mail on Sunday (London); Aug 13, 2006; LIZ JONES; p. 74

I found this in one of his emails: 'Male sexuality isn't emotional; in fact, emotionality is a turnoff for guys. Some of the best sex I've had has been completely meaningless Women still think a man's fidelity is proof of his love for them, when it's nothing of the sort. It's not love that makes a man faithful but a lack of opportunities to cheat and the fear of getting caught.

Once he's over those two hurdles, he's away! Monogamy is very difficult for men, and neither my friends nor I have managed it. Women need to be more honest about their own sexuality, too.

I've had unprotected sex with women who were being unfaithful themselves' Blimey. I padded down to the kitchen to confront him. 'So, you had the best sex of your life while you were in India?' I said calmly. 'You preferred having sex with those women to having sex with me.' (He no longer bothers to ask, by the way, how I know these things; it is a given that I still check his wallet, mobile phone and emails.) He had the cheek to smile. 'No. I said I have had some of the best sex I've ever had with women I barely knew.' I harrumphed. 'And you had unprotected sex with women who were also being unfaithful!' 'That was you, you daft moo,' he shouted good- naturedly back.

Ah. Well, OK, I did have unprotected sex with him on our first date, the day after I'd had sex (the halcyon period in my life that has gone down in history as 'the weekend I double parked') with my then 'boyfriend' (I use the term lightly; what boyfriend would have something better to do on Millennium Eve?) Kevin, the Osama Bin Laden lookalike with an aversion to spending more than Pounds 7.50 on a romantic dinner. But, as I primly pointed out, 'We might have done it on our first date, but I knew that you were going to be my husband.'

We then, inevitably, got into a discussion about how little he still does around the house, and how badly we communicate. For example, I had moaned to him a couple of weeks ago that I'd imagined, when we both started to work from home, that we'd have coffee together in the morning and chat.

'But you always sit in the garden, and it's cold!' he moaned, despite the fact it was still 75 degrees outside; he finds it very funny and retro that I still think in imperial. 'All I want to do in the morning is read the papers online and drink my instant coffee and be quiet.' He is probably breathing a huge sigh of relief at the news that I am off to Chicago today for work (he later sends a text to a male friend: 'Have the house to myself tonight. Fancy coming round for dinner?'). I am worried about leaving him in sole charge of the new house (he has no clue where anything is or how anything works), so I start telling him some useful points he should look out for. 'You must call Susie for her breakfast in a loud, high-pitched voice, otherwise she won't hear you. Give her gravy for dinner as a change from prawns. Leave a bowl of biscuits on the wall. Snoopy is feeling a bit bony, so he needs to have lunch as well. Don't shut the window on the stairs, because Susie likes to use that one. Don't pick up or annoy Sweetie.

I know Squeaky is on a diet, but give her a tiny amount of what everyone else is having so she doesn't feel left out. Feed the fish and the water snail. Change the bed.

Put the rubbish out.' Is it any wonder that sex with a stranger, even a plain, boring, dwarfish one, suddenly seems so tempting?

Labels: journalists, Liz Jones, Nirpal Dhaliwal

Following on from this incident over the weekend, the Daily Hate Mail choose to report Alan Gordon, vice chairman of the Police Federation, which represents more than 120,000 officers, [said] that [Scotland Yard Chief Superintendent Ali Dizaei and Assistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur were] 'sensationalist' to claim that there was now a new offence of 'travelling whilst Asian'.

Labels: Daily Mail, police, racism

Marriage is a good thing, even for me
Evening Standard (London); Jul 12, 2006; NIRPAL DHALIWAL; p. 37


SOME new research in America suggests that couples who live together rather than get married are merely in an "intense form of dating" because so many split up.

The average cohabiting couple in Britain lasts two years. More than half of them break up within five years of having a baby, while less than a tenth of married couples do. It seems marriage is the better bet for a long relationship. I read these pieces with a twinge of self-recognition.

I haven't been a great husband.

I've been unfaithful and slacked in my household responsibilities. My wife and I have had issues because of our different ethnic and social backgrounds, and she is also older and more successful than me. But despite our problems we've achieved six years together, four of them in marriage. We love each other and gain a great deal from having one another in our lives. Regardless of what the future holds, I'll always consider this marriage to be the most formative experience of my life.

When I got married, aged 28, I was looking forward to textbook happiness. I was determined to make it a success, without an inkling of what would happen and how I would behave. I wasn't prepared for how much I'd change and how much my personal baggage would make things difficult.

Despite the commitment I made to my wife in front of my friends and family, the desire to have independence and experience life (and other women) didn't disappear. It was just submerged, only to reappear later.

I was hoping for an all-consuming spiritual union that would make sense of everything. It was a shock for me to realise that I was still an individual whose path wouldn't always run parallel with my wife's, and that I'll always have issues that I have to work out for myself. Knowing that about yourself and your partner lets you give them space to evolve. I'm sure that's why my wife took me back.

She knew I had stuff to work through that I was only dimly aware of myself.

Getting married didn't harmonise our characters or prevent trouble arising, but it was a forceful declaration of commitment that stemmed from how much we loved each other.

That commitment is what has kept us going and made us have to deal with each other's flaws and screwups. If we hadn't been married the urge to quit and not deal with each other would have prevailed.

Marriage has taught me how complex life and people are. Though we've been married a while now, I never feel that I wholly know my wife. I'm sure she'd say the same about me. I think that's just how people are: however intimate you are with someone, they'll always be something of an enigma. Had I not been married, I'd still naively think that a neat and perfect life was out there and be wasting a lot of time trying to find it. I know things are more complicated than that now. It's been a valuable lesson.

Without my wife I am a hideous slob
Evening Standard (London); Aug 2, 2006; NIRPAL DHALIWAL; p. 35

MY WIFE has been away on holiday this week. I love having the house to myself.

I bask in the silence, freedom and solitude, but I also realise how thankful I am to be married.

Within minutes of my wife's departure, I reverted to my Neanderthal default setting. Now, after a couple of days on my own, I'm starting to frighten myself. Without a woman's disciplining presence, I'm a retarded slob, wholly incapable of looking after myself.

I love cooking, and when my wife's around I make interesting and creative meals: Indian, Thai, Italian, all sorts. But the gourmet in me vanishes the moment I'm left alone. My fridge is packed with delicious organic food but last night my dinner consisted of a tube of Pringles, a couple of chocolate eclairs and a packet of cigarettes. I was so disgusted with myself I binged on ginger snaps to improve my mood. Needless to say, it didn't work. I crashed on the couch in a bloated stupor, promising I'd purge myself with a jog in the morning. I never did.

The most basic habits of tidiness have disappeared. The sink is full of coffee cups, though it takes no effort to put them in the dishwasher. The bed hasn't been made once, and unopened post and old newspapers are strewn all over the kitchen table.

I've collapsed into a useless slump.

I feed the cats and take a shower, then pat myself on the back for a productive day.

When the wife is gone, I become a porn freak. Intending only to have a sneaky peek, I drift into hours of surfing through mucky sites, watching hot women getting their groove on. This is what guys do when no one is around.

Black, white, gay, straight, rich or poor - we all look at porn.

Lots and lots of it. It's what God made the internet for. I now set the alarm on my mobile phone, to jar myself into reality after 30 minutes.

If I didn't, I could easily lose the whole day doing it.

I'd planned to spend this week reading and writing, and planning future projects; instead, I've had a bout of shabby, cretinous indolence.

What spooks me about my present state is that I never slobbed out this badly until I moved in with my wife.

I'm sure it's my id, avenging itself for its repression during the everyday civility of married life. But men need the civilising company of women. Without them, we fall into a dark, primordial spiral of gluttony, masturbation and death.

Women are often a pain in the male butt, but they save men from themselves.

I'm looking forward to the wife coming home, but it's good for me to witness what I'd be like if she weren't around. Right now, it's like I'm spending the week in a theme park of unfettered masculinity. Believe me, it's not a pretty sight.

Awww, isn't that sweet? When she's not in the flat he misses her.

Labels: journalists, Liz Jones, Nirpal Dhaliwal

I wonder if I could claim moral asylum in another species.

Two men were removed from a flight for apparently being of Asian appearance and speaking Arabic. Well, what with the delays to air traffic in and out of the UK I think we can pretty much chalk this up as a clear victory for the terrorists.

[Heath] Schofield, who was travelling with his wife Jo and their children, said: "We all started boarding the flight. Our daughter noticed a couple of guys that were perhaps acting a bit strange. They went to the front of the queue, went to the back of the queue, and then they went and sat down by themselves. Anyway, we got on the plane and we boarded and it became apparent after we were already supposed to be flying that several of the passengers had refused to board the craft. A few rumours went round, it was a little bit like Chinese whispers, and then some more people decided they were getting off."

Wow, people moving around while boarding a plane. The rest of the passengers should have murdered them with broken bottles and then feasted on their hearts. That would have taught them not to try flying when not-white! It's asshatted behaviour that our political leaders have done nothing but encourage since 11th September 2001. Expect renewed calls for Muslim leaders to denounce terrorism during this coming week, as though it was Muslim's fault for white people's paranoia.

Labels: racism, The War Against Terror

What right-wingers see when they read the New York Times. I'd ask for someone to do a English version of this but I'm not sure we have a national left-wing paper to start with.

Labels: Conservatives, humour

I don't really read that many comics any more, most weeks I seem to spend more time reading various comics related newssites and blogs than the actual articles. So when I go to the graphic novel emporium of choice (Gosh! of course) to buy GNs for the library it's rather akin to that scene in Trainspotting where they get the newly-clean Renton hooked on scag again just to check the quality of the product they're about to sell to a London bigwig. And they arrived in the library today... Oh my precious ...

Labels: comics

Channel 5 have advertised showing the Mel Gibson film The Man Without a Face with a clip of him doing the 'hath not a jew feelings?' speech from Shakespeare then a clip of him driving and a v/o saying "This time he's sober. We think."

Labels: anti-Semitism, Mel Gibson, movies

30% of Americans polled couldn't say what year the 11th September attack on the World Trade Centre happened. I suppose that the word 'polled' should be emphasised, and we have to hope that the smart Americans were too busy working to answer the phone to the pollsters who had to go to the ill-educated daytime soap crowd instead, but Jesus. It shows why Shrubya got elected that one time...

Labels: 11/09/01, The War Against Terror, United States

Part One, Part Two.

More from the new Doctor Ruth.
What's a girl to do?

And what does Nirpal think a girl should do?

Single, thirtysomething women, whose body clocks are ticking down,

'like my wife'

are presented with two bleak choices. You can get with some dorky wimp who looks like great dad material... and then live your life in semi-contented boredom... Or, you can waste your years waiting for the guy who hits all the buttons — sexual, intellectual, financial and emotional — before giving up entirely by the time your ovaries are clapped out. You’ll then become another of those creepy, IVF-assisted crones, struggling to bring up triplets who will outlive you after a couple of years.

Share and share alike. As so many guys are lame, emasculated washouts, the few tomcats that are left out there know exactly what they’re worth. It’s silly to expect them to be monogamous.

Yes, Nirpal's number one tip for success is to accept that your man will play around and don't make the mistake Nirpal's wife did of expecting his to exhibit a moment's guilt about it.

Sexy guys get so much tail waved in their faces these days it’s impossible for them to behave themselves. Rather than fighting each other over these boys, women should learn to share them around. The alternatives — spending your life with a total sap or having your heart broken because of absurd expectations — just aren’t worth it.

Women! Empower yourselves by arranging your time around a man, preferably who's written a book called 'Tourism' and who's name sounds like 'Irpal Aliwal'. The new freedom smells suspiciously like the old male wet-dream.

The new polygamy wouldn’t be the oppressive institution it was before. It would be a pragmatic solution to a real problem, enabling every woman to get a regular dose of great sex from a guy who flips her lid. Surely every true feminist appreciates the egalitarian justice of this.

Polyamorists everywhere, Nirpal is ON YOUR SIDE. Isn't that a relief?

Consummate the sisterly love. As most women are more of a man than any guy will ever be, it makes sense for you to seek happiness with each other. One of the few places left where a lady can feel like a real woman is in the burly arms of a bull dyke. The only people allowed to be guys these days are girls. Stubbly chinned, testosterone- injected drag kings are the only ones who will take you out and show you a good time, paying for everything while stroking your butt and whispering smut in your ear — just like in the good old days. Lesbianism is a far more dignified option than contemporary heterosexuality. Chicks who have sex with women have way more feminine integrity than those who date men who pretend to be women.

'... As long as you let me watch.' I mean, where do you start with drivel like this? Is there any point?

The final option is to get with the global economy. Like Liz Hurley and Jemima Khan, you can outsource your sexual and procreative needs to the developing world. There are millions of smart, handsome brothers out there itching to better themselves in the West. Your UK passport is your ticket to ride into Benetton heaven. This is especially great news for the fat, the dumb and the ugly: your comparative affluence and the lure of British residency means you can snare the kind of stud who wouldn’t look at you twice in this country.

Well, you can't say Nirpal's not wanting to give anything back to the old country. In this case it would be all the mingers, presumably so the gorgeous women who are left can concentrate on lezzing it up before having group sex with him.

Interracial sex is always pretty hot. You white girls will have a blast as you strenuously work through your fantasies, guilt and historical grudges in the bedroom. And he’ll be able to satisfy that abiding desire that no white man can fulfil: mixed- race babies. Gorgeous, brown-skinned dumplings who look adorable in Baby Gap. In a single, slick move of miscegenation, you will kill several birds at once: you’ll have cute kids, get back at your racist, uptight parents and prove that, unlike most white people, you are not a total square.

Buh? Gah?

In India, women dig roads in 40C heat with their babies strapped to their backs. In Africa, they have their labia stitched shut by their elders.

So, if you've been raped in a nightclub toilet, don't go complaining to the police. Be thankful you're living in the First World.


There's also the Nirpal Dhaliwal Divorce Liz Jones Now! petition online as well.

Labels: journalists, Liz Jones, Nirpal Dhaliwal

Jesus and Mo take on Christian Voice and Osama Bin Laden. And if you're a Muslim who wants to take offense, please see the first entry.

Labels: Christian Voice, Fundamentalists- Christian, Fundamentalists- Islamic, Islam, Muslims

Portishead are working on a new album. Wouldn't it be great if they released it in time to be used for the This Life special?

Labels: music

The terrorists new secret plan. [via Boing Boing]

Labels: humour, The War Against Terror

Another white Government minister attacks the letter from Muslims. And Margaret Beckett has joined in as well.

Mr Reid told the BBC: "No government worth its salt would stay in power in my view, and no government worth its salt, would be supported by the British people if our foreign policy or any other aspect of policy was being dictated by terrorists.

Two points. Our foreign policy is already being dictated by terrorists, or does the Government's fondness for rewriting history extend to a belief we were going to invade Afghanistan and Iraq if September 11th hadn't happened? And if it's not okay for our foreign policy to be dictated by terrorists but it is alright for our domestic policy, as ID Cards are coming in to save us all from Al Qaeda?

The letter from the British Muslim groups.

It seems to me that the British Government is in a bind here. The terms of the letter are such that either the British foreign policy is or isn't dictated by terrorists and their acts but in either case the letter's criticism is valid. Which is probably why so many members of the Government are jumping to denounce it.

Labels: Government, Muslims, The War Against Terror, United Kingdom

King of the Kerb
Great Things

Labels: Britpop, music, YouTube

Foreign Office minister Kim Howells has criticised Muslim leaders for condemning British foreign policy. Because, you see, the Muslim leaders are there for the British government to blame for not doing anything about the radicalised youths in their community. That doesn't mean they should get ideas above their station and start thinking they're a part of the British people, why that would just be crazy. And it's patent nonsense to suggest that Muslim people have a better idea of what Muslim people think than a white Government minister.

It would be nice to hope that Kim Howells would be using his summer holiday in some useful and constructive way, like GETTING A FUCKING CLUE, but that's probably too much to ask for.

Labels: Government, Islam, multiculturalism, Muslims, The War Against Terror

Oy! Who turned Summer off? I know I was whingeing about the heat but I wanted you to turn it down , not switch it right round to Winter. Bloody global warming, if it's not melting bits off of you it's freezing them instead.

Labels: weather

More of the same from Nirpal Dhaliwal. This time he tones down the misogyny to give more space to his confused ideas about masculinity and maleness, David Cameron gets a kicking for trying to be a New Man, we have the old Acting nice and caring was once just a ruse, used by ugly guys to get laid. But somehow this lame, wholly contrived persona has become a template for British masculinity. Then it turns out that this is an ethnic thing:

The omega male is generally a white-boy phenomenon. Confronted by the more robust masculinities presented by some black and Asian men, white men have cultivated an extreme effeteness, possibly trying to mark themselves as being more civilised.

See? It's only white guys who would be stupid enough to treat the women in their relationships as equals and that's because we're racist!

Asian men flounder, unable to decide between the enticements and insecurities of western life, and the rigid certainties and comforts of traditional patriarchy. Few know how to integrate the competing elements of their masculinity into an honest, functional whole.

Like Nirpal.

The truth may be that the only women who genuinely find sensitivity and emotional literacy a turn-on are lesbians. They find feminine qualities attractive and are, accordingly, attracted to women. It might be that the typical alpha female is just a repressed, high-power dyke; unwilling to express her homo nature, she instead seeks out feminised men who will make the least sexual demands of her.

Quoted without comment.

Oh, and just so we're clear about this, Nirpal is 100% male.

Unlike omega males, I was confident with my end of the deal: I was young, fit and handsome, and I was giving her a lot of hot sex. She wasn’t going to kick me out. [Emphasis mine].

Labels: journalists, Liz Jones, Nirpal Dhaliwal

I'm making with the naughty and posting this in full, as otherwise the Daily Mail website will probably swallow this whole in a few days. Still, here's the original article here.

Now, the Daily Mail attacking feminism is nothing new. However, they do normally get women to write articles attacking women for working for a living, so getting a man to do it is something different.

The first half of this article by Nirpal Dhaliwal is fairly standard stuff about how it's a shame that today men aren't real men and women actually have dreams and aspirations above having babies and looking adoringly at their man while doing sewing or something.

Then it gets a bit disturbing. It's real 'dark side of the Dhaliwal' stuff and perhaps reveals more about his fucked up ideas about sex and sexuality than he would like. Or rather, if he truly believes what he does, then no woman should go within groping distance of him.

How feminism destroyed real men.

Women thought the last victory of equality was to make men more 'sensitive'. The bitter irony, says this male writer in a piece that will infuriate the opposite sex (including his wife Liz Jones), is women don't like wimps after all...

At a dinner party recently, I encountered the depressingly familiar sight of a dynamic thirty- something woman accompanied by a nerdy male sidekick that she'd browbeaten into proposing to her.

The mismatch in power was obvious. She was successful, ambitious and confident; he was a diffident, overweight, shrinking violet who measured every word he spoke in case he said anything remotely contentious that might offend her.

On her wedding finger was the most enormous, glittering engagement ring. A mutual friend later told me she'd initially been presented with a less garish but more exquisite diamond but had told her fiance to return it to the shop and get her something bigger.

That huge diamond was his declaration of surrender in the sex war. But I didn't feel sorry for the stupid sap; he should have been man enough to tell her to get lost and find some other dummy.

Instead, he'd been sucker-punched into a lifetime of nagging and neglect, and looking at his bossy wife-to-be parading her huge rock, I felt a shiver of pre-emptive schadenfreude.

Her smug smile might have given the impression that her glossy-magazine-inspired life was all going to plan, but I could see the tragedy to come.

One day she'll realise how dull and unfulfilling it is to have a man who doesn't answer back, who offers no challenge or danger - but by then she'll be over the hill and stuck with him for fear of being left on the shelf. Sadly, this is the state of many marriages today.

Back in the Nineties, emboldened by the successes of feminism, women sought to slay the dragon of patriarchy by turning men into ridiculous cissies who would cry with them through chick-flicks and then cook up a decent lasagne.

Suddenly, women wanted to drive home their newfound equality by moulding men to be more like them.

This velvet revolution was reflected in a series of broader cultural changes. After decades of uncompromising movie heroes like Marlon Brando and Clint Eastwood, we were asked to fall for stuttering, floppy-haired fops like Hugh Grant; touchy-feely and hopelessly embarrassed around women.

No doubt at the time, millions of misguided single women thought that having a man who could feel their pain and emote for Britain was a Good Thing.

Now, over a decade later, women are waking up to the fact that these men are drippy, sexless bores. The feminisation of men hasn't produced the well-rounded uber-males women were hoping for.

Instead, women are now lumped with flabby invertebrates, little more than doormats, whom they secretly despise but are too proud to admit it.

Rather than partnership, professional women tend to seek dominance in a relationship. They map their lives out early on and pursue their dream of 'having it all' with cold-blooded ruthlessness.

Young women have a crystal-clear agenda: they want the career, the wardrobe, the smartly furnished house, the 4x4 and the cute kids they'll ferry in it to expensive schools. No man is going to get in their way; and the men they choose for themselves are pliant and feeble enough to facilitate that programme.

Concentrating so much energy on work and family matters requires these women to pick a man who is predictable and secure, who won't upset the apple cart by pursuing dreams and instincts of his own.

These are cardboard cut-out men who gush with empathy whenever their wives and girlfriends need to dump their professional stresses and female angst on them: weak and soulless men who haven't the guts to make a mark themselves, who take the passenger seat in their women's juggernaut journey to post-feminist Nirvana.

But having ticked off the various items on their life checklist, women are left with a nagging sense of dissatisfaction. Where was the drama? Where was the passion? Where was the stimulation and growth?

It was all forsaken for an anodyne, materialistic shopping spree that is a Good Thing. ultimately a poor substitute for a real life. These women consider themselves to be alpha-females, but they are nothing but a pathetic sham.

A true Amazon couldn't stand the company of a supplicant male, let alone marry one. Real alpha-women are the ones who can more than hold their own with an alpha-man.

OK, strap yourself in, this is where it starts to go Mexican insanity peppers...

Deep down, women love men who stand up to them, who won't be pushed around. They love men who will look them in the eye and tell them to shut up when their hormonal bickering has become too much.

They love men who will draw a line in the sand and walk out on them when they've had enough. They love men who know their own minds and are man enough to stick to their guns.

Women: Just 'hormonal bickerers'. It's those wombs that do it. I'm worried about what life lessons Dhaliwal has learnt from his relationships, that it's all about one half of them being completely dominant over the other. Mind you, I'm currently single, so perhaps I should just shut up and go look for a club with which to stun a mate.

I'm always telling my wife, the writer Liz Jones, to shut up. She gets into a prissy huff about it, but I know she respects me for not indulging her neuroticism. Long ago, I realised it is unhealthy for a man to embroil himself in arguments with women.

'She acts as though she hates it but I know that secretely she loves it'. Isn't that what abusers believe (Hasty Note: I'm not claiming that Dhaliwal is or ever has abused another human being, except indirectly by writing for the Daily Mail).

While men want an argument to make sense and have a rational conclusion, women solely want the argument itself: it's a pressure valve for their emotions, and once they get started there is no stopping them.

Nirpal? Meet Dave Sim.

I have a very low boredom threshold; I can't bear having protracted discussions about where my wife and I 'are going'. Nor can I bear to listen to the gossipy, highly detailed 'He said, she said' monologues that women drift into when telling you about their day.

I deal with these elements of the female personality with impassive indifference. People might call me a sexist pig, but I am the opposite. I love women, and I love my wife because she is brilliant and incredibly strong.

'...If only she'd stop talking.'

I am a true feminist, because I only want to be with a powerful and capable woman.

'...That doesn't talk.'

No sexist could cope with having a wife as intelligent and independent as mine.

No male-feminist would want to dominate his wife in the way you seem to feel would be best.

Our relationship would never have worked had I been an effete New Man, desperately wanting to sympathise with the female condition.

Aah, 'effete'. Masculinity issues much?

My wife would have grown to loathe me for my fawning cowardice. She is a warrior and she needs to be with someone who is a match for her. Knowing the limits of what I will deal with in a relationship, I maintain my self-respect and, accordingly, gain hers.

Again, 'She acts as though she hates it but I know that secretely she loves it'.

Men are now generally terrified of women. They hold their tongues for fear of being misinterpreted as sexist; they constantly attempt to secondguess their partner in order to avoid giving offence.

'Damn those bitches, they stop me from fucking swearing every cunting minute. Next thing they'll be insisting I cover my mouth when I belch after sinking a brew'.

They preen themselves with groaning shelves full of beauty products so they won't incur derision and scorn. They suppress their masculinity and present themselves as cuddly Mr Nice Guys, and won't project self- confidence in case it's regarded as unreconstructed machismo.

Hmmm, metrophobia?

This backfiring feminist conspiracy has, of course, developed hand in hand with the march of raging political correctness in Britain. The two have combined like some potent chemical reaction to explode in the faces of a generation of women who thought that a 'moulded' man would make for a desirable one.

In recent years, men have been trained like circus seals to be inoffensive to women, and no longer know how to entice them and turn them on.

The what now? Is Dhaliwal too wrapped up in his Gorean homelife to be aware of what is going on outside? Does he seriously think men and women are not turning one another on out there? Or does he believe, perhaps more worryingly, that the only sex out there is between the brutes and the girls that put out and shut up?

But women secretly long for a man with swagger, who is cocky and selfassured and has the cheek to stand up them and make fun of their feminine foibles.

'Oh don't you worry your empty head about that you silly bitch!'

They long for the rakish charm of a man who knows there's a whole ocean of fish out there, who isn't afraid of being himself in case he is rejected.

The truth is, a real man doesn't care what any woman thinks of him. He doesn't care what anyone thinks of him: he answers solely to his spirit.

He wants something, he takes it. This is a mans world. And so on...

Real men don't pretend or even try to understand women. They simply love them for being the mysterious, capricious creatures that they are.

Fear of women badly disguised here.

And they don't take them too seriously, either.

'Oh don't you worry your empty head about that you silly bitch!' Does his wife know exactly how little he thinks of her and her sex? Unless this article is a giant piss-take I can't believe a woman would live with this man UNLESS he was beating her up.

They know the vicissitudes of the female mind, its constant insecurities and the fluctuations in mood.

Womb-phobia/hatred.

Rather than pander to them, they simply watch them drift by like so many clouds on the horizon. They don't get entangled in a woman's feelings and listen to her prattling on and on until she's talked herself out. Such strong and stoic men are exactly what women need to anchor themselves amid the chaos of their emotions.

Sometimes my wife bemoans my detachment and laissez-faire attitude to our marriage and wishes I were more wrapped up in her. I tell her she would soon get bored of it, because men who put women on a pedestal can't make love to them in the way that women want.

A man who is too in awe of his woman isn't going to tear her blouse open and ravish her on the couch; he isn't going to pull her hair and whisper profanities in her ear. Whenever my marriage is at a crisis point, and my wife's ego and mine are jostling for a position of supremacy, we inevitably have strenuous, battling sex.

My wife is older and more successful than I am, but the bedroom has always been the arena in which I have brought her down to earth.

'Women love my cock' basically. I wonder how often the Daily Mail gives an arena for a man to talk about how fantastic his dick is.

The female orgasm is the natural mechanism by which men assert dominion over women: a man who appreciates this can negotiate whatever difficulties arise in his relationships with them.

Last Christmas, my wife threw me out after discovering I'd been cheating on her. On the night we got back together, I made strong, passionate love to her. Unfaithful as I'd been, I was not going to let her have me over a barrel for the rest of our marriage. I needed to keep a sense of self and not allow her to mire me in guilt and a desperate quest of forgiveness.

Yes Nirpal, god forbid your wife should try anything as deceitful as try to make you feel guilty for cheating on her. I'm sure she acted like she hated your unfaithfulness but secretely she loved it.

I needed to let her know what she would be missing if we broke up for ever. I gave her a manful bravura performance that night, and at the height of her passion, I asked her: 'Who's the boss?'

The question threw her. Initially she wouldn't give me a reply, but I enticed it from her. 'You are,' she finally gasped. 'You are!'

'... And then I tossed her off the bed, ordered her to get me a beer and a steak and lit a cigarette. Job done.'

I am a very difficult man to be with. I know I have caused my wife great pain and anxiety. But she is an adult, and ultimately it is wholly her choice whether she wants to be with me or not - I cannot be anyone other than myself.

A sexist borderline-homophobe who is so afraid of women that he seeks to dominate them whenever possible.

I don't believe in working on relationships

No shit?

and making artificial efforts to give them substance. I believe in people being themselves and following their hearts towards whatever destiny lies before them.

When women choose to be with New Men, they are choosing a life that will be only half-lived. I think a lot of them are finally waking up to that fact. Relationships between independent and assertive people will always be fraught with tensions, but they have enormous creative energy.

Despite the many problems my wife and I have endured, we have both come a long way since we first met six years ago.

Well, she's clearly learnt there's no point talking to you about anything. Perhaps when you asked her 'who's the boss?' during sex she was confused only because she wasn't used to you allowing her to speak in your presence.

We have challenged one another to grow - professionally, intellectually, emotionally and spiritually. This would never have happened had she flaked out and gone for a softer option in her choice of partner.

Bring back the real men, girls. You might just remember why you loved them in the first place.

UPDATE: Jessica at Feministing has found this article by his wife, Liz Jones, that although written a year ago, makes for incredibly sad and grim reading.

Was it worth getting married? My husband asked me that question the other day after one of our pointless, whingeing arguments... "Well, was it?" he said, trying to goad me into a response. I told him he had, yet again, "ruined my weekend, which is mean because I work really hard all week", and that I could do without the slamming of doors and the stony silences and us manoeuvring around each other in the kitchen, making separate snacks, and that if he can't be nice to me he should move out... How on earth did it come to this? Why on earth did we do it in the first place?

So there you go Nirpal, you totally dominate your wife and she feels desperately unhappy. Go you! Have an extra beer to celebrate.

Labels: journalists, Liz Jones, Nirpal Dhaliwal

Not so much stupid as charmingly daft. We had an earnest man in his late-twenties/early-thirties come in wanting advice. He had an anti-terrorist plan you see, a sting operation . His great plan was that we let it be known to the terrorists that the Israeli Prime Minister was flying on a particular plan, because then obviously Al Qaeda will flood that plane with their best terrorists but then it turns out that the PM rumour was actually a lie and we arrest all the terrorists. I pointed out the airports would be a bit busy right now but that didn't seem to worry him, he said he'd been watching the news with his wife this morning. I wonder if his wife comes with her own air pump? Rather than waste time trying to explain to the man why his plan probably wouldn't work I told him to print out his plan, take it to the police station and ask for it to be passed on to the Anti-Terorrism unit. It turned out he'd hand-written his great plan, but it was OK because his handwriting was 'quite neat'. I didn't ask what colour ink he'd written this in and he went off happy, full of enthusiasm to do his beat to fit terrorists.

If we were in the United States, he'd be President right now.

Jesus and Mo take on Christian Voice.

So, if the US administration is working with the French again, is it time for the US right-wing blogosphere to bury the hatchet?

So, Brighton Pride at the weekend was fun. The trick on the hot days is not to do the march so you don't arrive at the park all tired and wanting to die.

I made my way down to Brighton on Friday, meeting up first with M and S who are moving down to Hove on the general London/Brighton exchange program that exists in this country. Accordingly there were probably two art-school hippies who woke up confused in Tottenham on Saturday evening.

Of course, I took great pleasure in pointing out that moving in to the Brighton and Hove area on Pride day was probably one of the most hellish things to imagine, if moving house, marriage and divorce are up there as the most stressful things that can happen to a couple then moving into Brighton on Pride day probably ranks as each of them added and then squared. I haven't been able to check yet whether they are still together.

M was living somewhere to the west of Brighton so, while we waited for S to sort out last minute problems at her place of work and join us I helped M with the shifting of boxes from the old place to the new. It's a very nice place with three rooms, a bathroom and a kitchen, plus a balcony. All in all a very nice place for around £700 a month, I'd been led to believe that Brighton and Hove rents were as high as London but getting you a lot, lot less. The flat is in a tower block that has hints of the old ITV Poirot designs but is probably more modern than that.

C got back from organising the Brighton Bothways Pride float to join in the fun and we went up and down the narrow stairs carrying boxes in before heading back into town to celebrate the arrival of these new Hoveans with the traditional Brighton food of a Chinese restaurant.

I can't remember if I've ever mentioned here before about C and my bodyclocks. I've tended to be a morning person while C is a creature of the night. We're at our collective best at about 3:00 pm, after which it's all downhill. I'm a stay-at-home type, C will spend the first few hours of consciousness each day declaring "I'm not going to go out tonight, I fancy a quiet night in" until deciding at about 9:00 pm she's just going to pop along to that party/nightclub she heard about and will only be there for five minutes... or five hours. It's an arrangement that suits us well when we meet up.

Anyway, it's rare that C wakes up before me in the morning but the heat does seem to have been buggering with my bodyclock, making me sleepy in the morning and not waking properly until the afternoon. C wasn't marching today and was the one that had to go to Preston Park and set up the Bothways stall for when Pride opened. My experience of marching two years ago was one I didn't particularly care to repeat, so I decided to hang out with her instead. We got a taxi, first over to the west side of Brighton to pick up some stuff from other people in the group, then to Preston Park. I was very impressed that a twenty to twenty-five minute trip over five or six miles only came to about ten quid, the one mile journey from a tube station to my place in London costs about four quid a pop. We were dropped at Preston Park at about 9:00 am.

So things were fairly quiet when we first arrived, much like a deserted fairground. We found someone to show us to where the Brighton Bothways stall would be and made our way there. Of course, it was about halfway over the park from where we'd got out of the taxi, but on the way our spirits were lifted by this:

The perils of leaving your stand over night. The heat was already beginning to rise, our stand was positioned so that we'd be nicely shaded for the morning but would be under the full glare of the sun in the afternoon. We set out our leaflets with strategic use of sweets as paperweights, played with helium to blow up some balloons and prepared the tombola: a plastic bag full of numbered stickers, some of which were connected to some fabulous prizes. Yes, yes, I know it's a Lucky Dip, we were pressed for time and had a brainfart, okay? Then it was time to sit back and wait for the park to open.

There were three distinct waves of people, first the uninterested straights, mainly kids who were going round looking for stuff to pinch and freebies, then the non-marching queers then finally those that had come on the march from the seafront, including the rest of the Brighton Bothways crew, which gave me the perfect opportunity to go and find some lunch, as by now it was midday.

To be honest these sorts of things aren't really my scene, I did go wandering around several times but the stalls that are selling something I might conceivably buy are small and working on a ridiculous mark-up (by Brighton standards anyway) so otherwise there's not much to do other than watch humanity pass by. There were any number of Drag Royalty and Trannies who must have had the stamina of mountain-climbers to go out in the midday sun and not collapse, plus all the bears and the boys playing dress-up hanging out in their own special paddock at the bottom of the field. Skirting through the fairground I walked up the northern end of the park. I saw guys disappearing into the bushes but it seemed that most of them just wanted to avoid the queues for the toilets. By the end of the day there was a rumour that two guys had been arrested for fucking, whether this, and the rumour that the police had been told by an outraged straight mother of children, was true is for someone else to verify.

Mostly though I just tried to stay out of the sun. Most of our group of friends from Bicon that live in the south and south-east of England turned up or popped by, Brighton Pride has a deserved reputation as being more chilled than most other Prides in the country, and would certainly seem to have an edge over London. When things drew to a close at the park most people seemed to decamp to the beach, in preparation for a night of fun in Kemp Town.

As C lives right on the seafront we were probably ideally placed for this but, though we did go down to the beach at midnight, we gave clubbing a miss. Instead we got C's Blockbuster card, a copy of A Cock and Bull Story, some takeaway food and some cheap plonk and laughed ourselves silly. C&BS is the story of a group of actors gathered to make a film adaptation of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne, only for the story of the filming to imitate the story of the book, backtracking, sidetracking and allovertheplacetracking while the nominal star, Steve Coogan, worries about his role in the film being marginalised by the other talent. Very funny and don't worry if you've never read the book, C has, I haven't and we both enjoyed it equally.

After that, in the early hours of Sunday morning, it was finally time for bed.

Alan Moore. Melinda Gebbie. Interviewed by Stewart Lee about "Lost Girls." Thursday, October the 12th, 7pm at the Logan Hall, Institute of Education, 20 Bedford Way, London WC1H 0AL. £7 tickets, concessions £5, call 0845 456 9876 to book tickets, lines open from 9am to 6pm BST, weekdays.

Hopefully I won't forget I have a ticket for this like the time I had a ticket for Robert Newman at the Tricycle theatre and it then completely slipped my mind.

To the gentleman at Brent Cross tube station: Thanks for insisting on pushing your way into the carriage despite seeing there was no room. Using a young girl who I assume was either your grandaughter or pre-pubescent love slave as a wedge to drive before you was a stroke of genius but pressing her against people's thighs and elbows counts as sexual abuse. Still, you have the look of one that knows all about that sort of thing.

To the lady at Golders Green tube station: Well, if you try to get on despite the fact that I'm only a quarter-way out the carriage door I'm going to have to push by you to get off.

To the guy on the platform who huffed and tutted every time the announcer said how long we'd have to wait for the next tube train: Oh, wait, that was me ...

Greil Marcus writes George W. Bush's obituary.

UK biometric passports have been succesfully hacked.

Related article [via Physorg]

Sometimes it's not as bad as you think, it's actually a whole lot worse.

Far from intending to dump ID cards once he is in Downing Street, [Gordon] Brown is quietly studying how biometric technology - identifying people by unique markers such as fingerprints and iris patterns - could be expanded over the next 20 years to fight crime.

I have to remember, Brown is as much New Labour as Tony Blair and just because the former hates the latter does not mean he's a good person.

Right, I'm off to Brighton to hang out with a field full of perverts for a day. Back Sunday. In the meantime, please enjoy this press release from my favourite charmless bigots.

I've suspected that CV is just one lonely man in his bedsit and you can tell that he's that particular strain of Christian fundamentalist, in that he's seeing signs and portents where there is none:

As the row over the anti-Christian 'in the name of the father' ad intensified, a prominent Christian group today claimed responsibility for relieving the Gay Police Association of their collective sanity. The advertisement, showing a pool of blood next to a Bible, and headed 'in the name of the father', blamed Christians for what it described as 'a 74% increase in homophobic incidents' which it said had occurred 'over the last year'... Stephen Green, National Director of Christian Voice, said today: 'It is obvious the Indy advertisement is so over the top as to be completely indefensible. The only explanation is that the Gay Police Association has collectively lost what remained of their sanity. In that case, I believe Christian Voice can take much of the credit. No other Christian organisation has done so much that has got under their skin.'

Come again? This is rather akin to saying that the Asian tsunami means that God doesn't like women controlling their reproductive organs in the United States.

...'Life is imitating art. Our True Vision website carries the heading 'Christianity - together we'll crack it' (a take-off of various police slogans like 'street crime - together we'll crack it').'

So, the police slogan encourages people to think that if they come together they can bring an end to street crime. Therefore, logically, the Christian Voice slogan suggests that together people can also destroy Christianity. Finally, something I and the charmless bigots can come together on.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission have decided that the shooting of a man arrested during an anti-terror raid in east London was an "accident". Hurrah for our brave boys in blue! Twice people have unreasonably suggested that there should be some hint of punishment for people who shoot other people while hiding behind the technicality of being police and twice we've shown that British justice is the best in the world. After all, if these latest johnnies hadn't gone around being blatantly black then this would never have happened. Although, nudge nudge, we know this isn't a problem for our highly-trained,intelligent and colour-blind police force.

Menawhile, Meanwhile, Mr Kahar has been arrested by police on suspicion of making pornographic pictures of children. This is rather convenient don't you think? He won't be able to concentrate on that piffling matter of being shot while he deals with this. It took the police two months to check the computer? I remember 3-D of Massive Attack was arrested on suspicion of having child pornography near the start of his involvement with the Anti-Iraq War movement, these allegations were later quietly admitted to be a 'load of poo' by the fuzz.

Government plans to introduce ID cards are "inconsistent" and "lacking clarity", the Commons science and technology committee has said. Hello! Welcome to the debate! Where have you been for the last five years? Ever since Mad David Blunkett dreamt up this scheme while 'perpetuating the class struggle' with a posh American the three phrases that have defined this policy have been 'inconsistent' ("It's to stop terrorists! No it isn't! Yes it is! Plus identity fraud, although it won't stop identity fraud"), 'lacking clarity' and 'a batshittingly insane way to waste taxpayers money'.

Tony Blair insists ID cards will go on even though he won't.

I'd quite like to hear those words coming from Gordon Brown before I start to worry about what future the scheme has.

Battleskips!
Originally uploaded by Loz Flowers.

"Hello BBC2? I've got an idea for a programme to replace 'Robot Wars'..."

Well, the heatwave seems to have broken, at least for now. It's almost, dare I say it, a bit chilly ? Still, the weather might just be taking a break before going for what the weatherpersons a few days ago were threatening would be the hottest August evah!!1! Certainly a bit more sun and heat for Saturday would be nice. Brighton Pride. Haven't decided absolutely for sure, I am a fencesitter after all, but veering towards going.

It would seem that Father Christmas has written a book declaring Shrubya to be the son of God.

Hatemail received by the creator of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

I find your site degrading and offensive. God does not allow for the type of logical fallicies [sic] you promote on your site. For instance, why would a perfect, infanate [sic] being have to rest for three days after creation? The bible clearly establishes a maximum one to six day resting ratio for the creation of the universe by an infante [sic] being.

PASTAFARIAN?!? that doesn't even make sense!! why the hell would god be PASTA?!? It sounds like you were bored and asked "why don't pirates exist anymore? and why doesn't heaven have a stripper factory and a beer volcano?" Well buddy, just because you google searched some stupid fact and made a website, doesn't mean you made a religion.

I do believe you are a fucking retard and I hope you burn in hell. Fuck you and the flying spaghetti monster. Postmodernism is a self defeating concept. Read Josh McDowell's book for a good overview of what life is truly about you dumbass humanist. You obviously think life is just a big damn joke. Its all for humor and entertainment. I look forward to the day it fucks you right in the ass.

[via BoingBoing]

Is Mel Gibson an anti-semite?

Yes.
No.

Surely we can find some middle-ground where we all agree that he is, at least, a wanker?

Oh good grief. All that remains is for someone to do a film showing Shrubya reading the picture book to the kids, sitting around doing nothing, heading on a magical mystery tour on Air Force One before finally arriving back at New York to reassure Americans that they would kill lots of dusky-skinned people to make up for the tragedy at the World Trade Centre.

I really miss the days when Mash had to be about the Korean War becuse they weren't allowed to admit it was about Vietnam.

Have you heard the rumour that Hollywood are remaking Downfall but with Saddam Hussein substituted for Hitler?