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27/11/2006 @ 12:40
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That last bulletin got me thinking...what was #1 in the charts when I was born and each year after that? What indications does it have for my life? Would my birthday co-incide with the greatest moments of rock and pop history or be an embarrassing catalogue of drek...here are the results:
Birth: The Last Waltz - Engelbert Humperdinck (Oh God, the worst possible start in life!)
1 yr: Those Were The Days - Mary Hopkin (a slight improvement)
2 yrs: Bad Moon Rising - Creedence Clearwater Revival (that's more like it!)
3 yrs: Band Of Gold - Freda Payne
4 yrs: Maggie May - Rod Stewart (yeah!)
5 yrs: How Can I Be Sure - David Cassidy (It could have been worse; it could have been Donny Osmond)
6 yrs: Eye Level - The Simon Park Orchestra (the bloody theme from 'Van Der Valk!')
7 yrs: Kung Fu Fighting - Carl Douglas (so just watch out!)
8 yrs: Hold Me Close - David Essex
9 yrs: Dancing Queen - Abba (hey, October's looking like a good month!)
10 yrs: Silver Lady - David Soul (I spoke too soon!)
11 yrs: Summer Nights - John Travolta & Olivia Newton John (I don't like the 70's anymore! Make it stop!)
12 yrs: Message In A Bottle - The Police (Thank you, Lord)
13 yrs: Don't Stand So Close To Me - The Police (Two Police in a row...what are the chances?)
14 yrs: Prince Charming - Adam & The Ants
15 yrs: Pass The Dutchie - Musical Youth (Excuse my while I shoot myself)
16 yrs: Karma Chameleon - Culture Club (I don't like the 80's anymore, make it stop!)
17 yrs: I Just Called To Say I Love You - Stevie Wonder (I said, make it stop!)
18 yrs: If I Was - Midge Ure
19 yrs: Don't Leave Me This Way - Communards (More proof the 80's were shite)
20 yrs: Pump Up The Volume - MARRS
21 yrs: Desire - U2
22 yrs: Ride On Time - Black Box (and we draw a veil over the 80s...)
23 yrs: Show Me Heaven - Maria McKee (...and say hello to more shite from the 90s)
24 yrs: (Everything I Do) I Do It For You - Bryan Adams (I WAS born under a bad sign!)
25 yrs: Ebeneezer Goode - The Shamen (help....me!)
26 yrs: Relight My Fire - Take That featuring Lulu
27 yrs: Saturday Night - Whigfield (oh the pain!)
28 yrs: Fairground - Simply Red (I thought they'd died by then!)
29 yrs: Breakfast At Tiffanys - Deep Blue Something
30 yrs: Candle In The Wind '97 / Something About The Way You Look Tonight - Elton John (Couldn't Princess Di have died 3 months earlier?)
31 yrs: Rollercoaster - B*witched
32 yrs: Blue (Da Ba Dee) - Eiffel 65 (I take back everything I said about the 80s)
33 yrs: Against All Odds - Mariah Carey & Westlife (AAARRRRRRRRRRHHHHHHHH!)
34 yrs: Cant Get You Out Of My Head - Kylie Minogue
35 yrs: The Long And Winding Road - Will Young & Gareth Gates
36 yrs: Where Is The Love - Black Eyed Peas (The last 3 have all been cover versions...now even the inspiration has dried up!)
37 yrs: Call On Me - Eric Prydz (I have no idea who he is)
38 yrs: Push The Button - Sugababes (If I do, will it ease the pain?)
39 yrs: I Don't Feel Like Dancin' - Scissor Sisters (I don't feel like doing anything anymore)
Oh my, I'm going to need a stiff drink....one thing's for certain, I'm never listening to the radio on my birthday ever again!
Craig Not Blog
21/11/2006 @ 18:28
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I went to see "Casino Royale" yesterday...and I mean the new one not the David Niven/Peter Sellers fiasco...and was blown away by it. Do go and see it because it re-invigorates the Bond oeuvre, it's exciting, well done and Daniel Craig is very good indeed.
I'm glad for Craig. I for one thought his casting was a bit unusual but believed he could do the job well and he has. A sceptical media has been won over and James Bond fans and casual movie goers are liking him and the movie as well.
Well, most of them. Those bitter lobbyists, Craig-Not-Bond, still aren't happy. OK, so they were incensed by his casting enough to form a lobby group to try and pressure the studios and Eon productions to drop Craig and bring back Pierce Brosnan...fair dos, we live in a free land where whacked out views are tolerated. But the studios didn't cave in to the pressure and the petitions and stuck by Craig.
So Craig-Not-Bond started churning out the rumours: He had his teeth knocked out whilst filming a fight scene, he couldn't drive a manual transmission car and he would piss on copies of "Goldeneye" in between scenes. All these rumours proved false and the reports from the set all seemed to indicate that Craig was going to be a winner as James Bond.
Now the film is out and it's grossing big time: The second most successful Bond movie of all time in terms of opening weeks and a critical smash. You would expect the Craig-Not-Bond crowd to throw in the towel, admit defeat and say "fair dos Dan, we didn't like you at first but you won us over with a grass roots, back to basics interpretation of the Bond role that harks back to Ian Fleming's original work...mate, the part is yours". Or at the least say "well, I still don't think you're right for the part but I'm going to enjoy the movie nevertheless or not bother seeing it, and let's call it quits."
Oh no, not the Craig-Not-Bondites. Not content to continually pressurise the media and the studios to have Craig sacked, they have embarked on a campaign of disinformation and denial. For example, despite earning $42 million in its first 3 days, and a further $48 million worldwide (including $26 million in the UK), Craig-Not-Bond claim that the movie's a flop...being beaten at the box office by a movie about penguins. This is true, however, but the penguin movie opened at 400 more cinemas in the US, has yet to be shown outside of the US and attracts an under 10 crowd. Oh, and it pipped "Casino Royale" by only $700,000 which is chicken (or penguin) feed to Hollywood.
After claiming that the second most successful Bond movie of all time is a financial flop, Craig-Not-Bond claim that all the glowing reviews of the movie are fake; that the press has been bribed en masse by the studio. Every. Single. Review. Faked. All over the world, Columbia and MGM have spent gazillions bribing the world's entertainment journalists to give the thumbs up to "Casino Royale". That includes independent internet review sites like the IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes which base their ratings on ordinary film goers votes. Funny, I didn't see my cheque from Columbia in the mail this week. I must remind them to send it.
Craig-Not-Bond claims that Craig being offered a 3 movie contract and that he's already started work on his next one is a conspiracy: That Eon productions is forcing him on us, the poor Bond fans! They also claim that once "Casino Royale" has flopped for good, order will be restored and Brosnan will be re-instated as James Bond and that Craig will be fired from Bond 22. I won't hold my breath while that happens.
I was wondering, what other group out there on the internet holds on to a delusion so strongly, despite all the evidence to the contrary? Then I realised, it's Lunar conspiracy nuts! The same type of person who believes the Moon landings were faked are likely to believe that "Casino Royale" is a dud and that financial ruin and gnashing of teeth is all that awaits Eon productions and Columbia Studios.
Well, Craig-Not-Bond/Lunar Conspiracy Nuts...EXPLAIN MOONRAKER! Eh? Did James Bond really travel into space? Or was it faked?
Extra! Extra! Blog All About It!
17/11/2006 @ 18:30
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I've been absent for almost a week from here, BUT THAT'S DELIBERATE! You see, I spent a week as an extra (or supporting artists as we were officially called) on a one off BBC comedy show called "Stuck".
Now some people who work as extras just think it's a load of standing around or walking in the background...well, where's the professionalism in that? Even though you may be filling out a crowd or being Man In Street #1, you are someone in that story; though the focus may be on Tom Cruise, or Charlton Heston or Richard Briers, you are someone who has a story of your own, even though the cameras don't want to follow it. When the director says "action, everyone walk down the street" you've got to think who am I? Why am I walking down this street? Where am I going to? Do I smile at Tom Cruise as he passes me and mouth "ooh look it's Tom Cruise" (because I'm not paid to speak). In all I was in 7 separate scenes and wore different outfits in each so I had to be more than one character. Little sketches of their lives, mini-biographies and coming up with names (I didn't want to bother the writer of the show with these questions and details so took it upon myself to do the work...the producers will thank me one day) were all things I had to get sorted one way or another. So I was the following people:
BEEF McHARDROCK: Top asset stripper for Bastard and Company. He's off to destroy Mom & Pop's Baby Food Company and HE LETS NO ONE GET IN HIS WAY (hence the fast pace of his walking).
SKIP RUSHMORE: Loveable local character. Perhaps he's on his way to the betting shop, or down to the off licence for some beer? Maybe he's avoiding one of his many girlfriends! See how he jogs across the busy street to get from one side to the other.
RACE BURLY: Student teacher who's doing his PGSE at the local college. He's a young liberal teacher who really wants to help the kids of today. He's back from Pret A Manger with an avocado and bacon sandwich (which I had to purchase at my expense as Production wouldn't take it out of the props budget: Such is the detail I put into my work). See how he ambles to the bus stop; he's thinking about how to reach out and convince promising student Donna not to drop out of school and ruin her prospects.
TURK THRUST III: Turf Accountant. He's been left the business by his father, a rather formidable man, and he's determined that Thrust and Sons will dislodge William Hill as the top betting shop chain in the land. See how he narrowly misses falling into a pothole on his way to work.
BRICK HAMMERSTEEL: Graphic designer. Walking to work with his secretary, Bloom Mandarin, who he's secretly in love with. See how Brick neatly avoids a party of schoolkids walking in the other direction, momentarily pausing to to give them an admonishing look before walking off with the lovely Bloom to their offices.
I became those characters, I lived their lives and breathed their essence. I put on their skin as if they were my own. That's the only way you get to be the top supporting artist and to claim that coveted award of Film Extra of the Year: And on current form it's got to be a straight fight between me and Kenneth Wrotts, who has made the role of "man in post office queue" his own.
Isoblogs
11/11/2006 @ 23:49
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There seems to be an ever widening chasm between the real world in which all of us inhabit and the BBC Meteorology Department.
Tonight, Helen "All of Yesterday's Weather...Today!" Willets announced that today saw heavy showers in the South East...there weren't. There was a bit of rain last night, there was some overcast weather today but there was NO rain!
"After the heavy showers of today..."
There weren't.
"You can see the cloud moving across the South East..."
We can't.
"So expect more downpours over the next few days..."
We won't.
This is the latest in a series of wide of the mark weather predictions from the BBC Met office. Back in early October a hysterical and giggling Sarah "Isn't rain fun!" Wilmshurst boasted that "Summer just won't go away; October will see bright sunny shirtsleeve weather" whereas the truth was I freezed my knackers off and was in constant need of an umbrella for the most part. But she didn't just make a one off error. After a deluge of Biblical proportions, she came on the radio the next day to announce "That sunny warm weather is here to stay for the rest of the week." That sunny weather where exactly? Benidorm? West Texas? Death Valley?
The BBC need to get rid of the useless high tech display screen for the weather and instead invest in a window the forecasters can look out of.
Comprehension Blog
06/11/2006 @ 19:06
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I was going to talk about my trip to the British Society of Comedy Writers convention in London and the really irritating group of twentysomethings who got on a train I was on and thought they were so talented, they started singing at the tops of their voices and play crappy bongos...but Pierre and his drunken posse will have to wait for another day. Tonight, I'm going to do my tribute to a very special and unique individual called Hemmingssm in what I call
Hemmingssm: Portrait of an Internet Troll
Hemmingssm hangs out at the Internet Movie Data Base http://www.imdb.com and gives his opinions and asks questions in a language that approximates English and no other. It's not that his English is poor, per se, it's that he's clearly trying to re-invent it into a whole new form of communication...or lack of. For an example of his writing style, here's his opinion on The Catherine Tate Show:
"who trying act do natalie SONIA FOWLER whats her name pretty funny good
Catherine Tate u rock
did anyone see her on bbc1 breckfrost news so funny over week 1 news readers says so last seares how fell
she like no not u rong womean sayd was she cute kissed her hand
yooo
uppppppppppppppp "
Yooo uppppppppp is his way of signing off a message. Wheras most cogniscent folk try to use a phrase that intimates finality or an "until next time" way of signing off, Hemmingssm instead uses a kind of rapper form of hello. Oh, how ironic.
"yayyy woopp woopp
thanks
yooooooo
upppppppp "
...His opinion on whether Matt Lucas and David Walliams are funnier than Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.
He seems to have it in for overweight comedians though. Here's his comments on Johnny Vegas:
"jes wayy over 18 stone lots dat rick chubby bloke pop idole ever calld evywhare 1 sayd 19 stone he went cerlib fit club found 29 stone
yooo
uppppppppppp
noo diigtyyyyyyy"
John Candy...
"was he death anythink do with hes wight if so guess he ment weighted he diyed allso he hevey drink smoker allso i lost look john goodman he still he as hevey big as
john candy ever was
anyone yoo tar
uppppppp"
and Ronnie Barker...
"dose any no if shop he owned still going if it evean not whare is it
pluss dose no hes weight pretty big u think do he diyed
yooooo needs no
he so funny"
So Hemmingssm equates fatness with death. He also likes to comment on how other celebrities have died over the years but space precludes me listing his flights of morbid curiosity. However, he is quite a worrying person with a penchant for stalking fat celebrities, if his comments about Chris Moyles are to be believed:
"he thinks i stalker grrrrrrrrrrr just huge fan not done blogs my space donkyes grrrrrrrrrr iam one posted pic hes blog sayd frount top chris moyles is god back one day meet him wich will big fan all yoooooooooooo if up me he be on evy day 24/7 woopppppppppppp
on itv 1 now better win i sue itv1 grrrrrrr back on radio monday wooppp
noo diigtyyyyyyyyy
westside uppppp"
Some of his other pet sayings are "damn skippyy", "noo diigtyyyyyyyyy" and "westside uppppp" which he'll use at random intervals and with no indication as to whether they mean something good, bad, indifferent or whether they actually mean anything. He'll also spell please as police, for some unknown reason.
He'll watch anything, from "Bewitched" and "The Nutty Professor" to "Prime Suspect" and "Lawrence of Arabia"; it's all the same to him...damn skippyy and noo diigtyyyyyyy and wot iz he lik 18 stone why he diieyyye heart problemz sum won police tell meeeee nooo waayyyy upppppp.
Most of the time he posts something, the discussion thread dies. People just can't fathom out what he's saying so they prefer to start a new topic of conversation rather than reply to him.
OK, maybe he has learning difficulties and we shouldn't laugh at him or maybe he's 11 and just can't work out syntax when it comes to typing, but there's another perplexing clue as to whether he's on the level or not in this discussion about Fearne Cotton:
"dose anyone no Fearne Cotton views on smoking she likes kylie nminogue. bussting 2 no yoooooooooooo
think shes cute needs no view smoking kylie has she got my space
upppppppp
westsideeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
To which someone has replied: "Can you translate that into English?" (OK, confession time, that was me who said that)
Hemmingssm's reply is this:
"i kool da end try read harder yooooooooooo
uppp
dam skippyy"
He deliberately chooses to communicate like this, in his own language! It's US who have to realign our way of communicating with HIM. The only problem with this is that nobody else speaks his brand of gibberish so he's constantly talking to himself.
I was intruiged by this person, and Googled them...it seems they've been leaving a small trace of gibberish across a number of internet discussion forums and chatrooms...Hemmingssm is remarkably consistent in his obsessions and mode of communication.
So he's out there...what does he want? We'll probably never know...We'll have better luck deciphering Linear B than working out what point Hemmingssm is trying to make. But maybe we should not scorn him, but pay tribute by adopting damn skippy as a form of praise. Try dropping it into your conversation next week.
Yoooooo upppppppppppp everybody
What Shall We Do With The Drunken Blogger?
02/11/2006 @ 10:31
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I love the logic of drunks.
The other night, Wifey and I were on the tube (the London Underground for you overseas types) and there was this drunk on the train who attacked a woman. The train stopped and a policeman got onto the train and intervened to help the woman.
So, there you have this drunk on a crowded train, attacking this woman (not with a knife or knuckle dusters but manhandling her and trying to have his way with her), tons of witnesses, a big cop trying to arrest him, and he says
"I didn't do a thing"
Brilliant! Just tough it out, man.
"You were seen attacking this woman by 40 people" says the cop.
A pause...the drunk is mentally calculating his best options for a comeback.
"They're wrong"...see, this guy knows his stuff!
"I'm going to have to arrest you and take you to the police station"
Drunk mind busily at work...."You can't, I won't let you"
He knows his rights! He doesn't have to co-operate with the police if he doesn't want to, everyone knows that. Being arrested is a participatory event which requires the consent of the criminal.
"Get your hands off me! You cannot prevent me from travelling on the train! This woman is lying when she says I attacked her! Everyone's lying! Everyone's a f&%@!£# c&*!%! Stop looking at me! I know my rights! If I want to attack women then it's my right! Get your hands off me! Rape! This policeman is raping me! Someone help! Ooooh, I don't feel well! Oh God, what have I done! I'm sorry madam, I'll make it up to you! Here, have some of my drink! Go on! It's nice! Drink it you slut! Argh, you're just a whore! Like the rest of them! WHOOOOORRRREEEESSSS!"
Drunk logic is entirely entropic and I think it should be studied at our august learning institutions. But they won't...those b*%$!#@s! They never listen! WHOOOOORRREEESSS!"
