Can one ask for more ? Almost perfect. I took the day off work and met Zap on the train en route to Ravensbourne college for a stimulating morning. Fravia, one of my all time heroes, was giving a lecture and it was totally inspiring. After the talk I even got to shake the man’s hand. Thanks Fravia.

Afterwards, I, TenYen, JS, Zap, Jim and Derek had a very pleasant chat which reminded me how many sound people there are in the world. Very enjoyable. Hope we all get to meet again soon.
So then, Zap and I walked into Chistlehurst to go to the pub (after a very long detour that a friendly chap with naked-women-tatoos, and a quiff, pointed out was bogus…long and tedious story).
Despite the rain, we had some nice conversation in the outdoors, some good food, some good Guiness, and it was a truly lovely day.

A lovely weekend. The usual sort of friday experience – the work managed to pile up and so by the end of the day a select few of us sought refuge in the Union where the beer is cheap, and the giggles are free. For various reasons I had to blow out a meeting with Toby on Friday, so instead we met up on Saturday and spent the afternoon chatting in the Watch House…a bog standard Wetherspoon’s pub. Great stuff. The second good saturday in a row. After a little siesta, Michele and I watched the Eurovision song contest which was one of the best I’ve seen for years – truly bloody awful.
As the sun came out today we arranged to meet Mod and Ian in Greenwich for a picnic. Being a woman, Mod was an hour late so Michele, Ian and I had to have a couple of pints in the Mitre. Beautiful day, nice picnic (smoked salmon taramasalata is even better than it sounds), and then home to Humph.
As we were walking back from the park I had a tune stuck in my head – “how sweet to be an idiot”. Imagine my surprise when seconds later, at the bus stop, we met one of the worlds biggest idiots! What are the chances of that happening eh ?
A squat, twatty-looking geezer, in a fab retro nylon shirt, talking to a young bloke. The conversation went something like this:
“I was born just after the war, and we ‘ad none of this. Na, nuffink like all you ‘ave. National service…blah blah…money…blah clothes…rant…so if I was in charge, I’d get rid of all the immigrants from all the world. I wouldn’t get rid of the busses, as long as they ran on time.”
Ignoring the paradox of the last couple of assertions, the young man asked if he himself would be out of favour being Irish.
“Naaaah. You’re English”
“No, I’m Irish.”
“Naaah you’re English. If you’re Irish, you’re English.”
“No, I’m Irish.”
“Ahhh naaaaaah, you’re English aint ya ? I mean, Irish, Scottish, Welsh and that – you’re all English really aint ya.”
Michele and I had to walk behind the bus shelter to conceal our belly-laughs.
The 177 bus arrived. In order to demonstrate, to the rude throng of uncivilised immigrants around the bus stop, how we do things in ENGLAND, he barged right to the front of the queue and waved his bus pass angrily at the driver, who, having a full load, closed the doors and drove off.
Clearly it was now time for this proud Englishman to demonstrate the correct response which is to shout:
“BOLLOCKS. That’s fucking bollocks that is. Fucking bollocks.”
The young Irishman, still amused, fueled his anger by suggesting that perhaps the bus was over full because of the immigrants…which caused a pridictable response. The idiot ranted for a bit about having hundreds of pounds on him and how no-one would mug him because he “runs things round here” and then another bus arrived. The 199. Now, this bus takes a different route, and goes to a totally different part of London, but, so as not to let another single immigrant take a seat which was rightfully the property of an Englishman (be he Welsh, Scottish or Irish), he once again elbowed his way to the front of the queue, and barged on. What an ambassador for the country.
On the journey back we wondered how anyone could have such firm views on things which were so utterly stupid. The answer can only be that he spends his life drinking with men of equal, or greater, idiocy. Every time he makes one of his lunatic assertions, eg
“If it was up to me right, I fink that everyone, in the whole world should be English”
Rather than walk away in astonished disgust, laugh or punch him, they probably say:
“This is it!”
or
“Zackly!”

“I reckon the only reason the trains dont run on time is because the government give all the money to the blacks and the pooftahs.”
“Zactly, this is it.”
Thus strengthening the field of stupidity around them all, and making them all feel more justified.

I mean, this is it!
Zackly!

Watching The Hits on saturday (a bit like The Box only more crap) got me addicted. When Freeview came out it was essentially the Kylie and Timberlake channel. But, as more people get Freeview it appears to be getting more safe.
Several tunes have been squatting in my head recently, and now, after a couple of failed attempts and a couple of quid, I have the videos. If you don’t know “Mass Destruction” by Faithless then you are probably over 30, like me, and will hopefully discover how brilliant it is soon.
While I’m on the subject, could someone please explain why the video for “Laura” by “Scissor Sisters” on The Hits is totally different from that available all over the Internet (from legit and dodgy sources). Oddly, the one on The Hits is, IMHO, far, far better. If anyone knows the story of why there two different videos then PLEASE let me know.
Apart from falling in love with Ana Matronic and the bloke from Faithless, I have been leading a very normal existence. Cash worries, existential terrors and work being shit, are all factors which have sparked a new interest in getting a new, stupidly overpaid, job. In fact, this prospect is keeping me going at present.

Earlier this week I was fortunate enough to see Alex, Alvira, and Judy, on Alex’s last night before he flew off to a new life in Mexico. It’s surprising how emotional this made me feel. Good Luck Alex.

CU Friday Tobes 😉

Good night

—
“Inaction is a weapon of mass destruction” – Faithless

Yesterday, deprived of IP in the am, Michele and I watched the two crappy music channels that Freeview managed to scrape out of the gutter. Normally these provoke gobbing at the tube; Britney, boybandz, Kylie ad nausiam. But we were lucky enough to get the few good tunes. The Streets- you’re fit but don’t u know it (read the bio – the guy *must* be alright), Scissor Sisters – Laura, and Jay-Z – 99 problems. OK, as “artists” they have all produced a lot of shit. But these particular tunes are all…”def”…as we used to say in my day 😉 And the vids all work. Makes me happy in a sad way.

Trying to face a weekend without IP was enough to keep me awake last night. As soon as I surfaced I got on to 151. Their automated service let me know that the problem we still had, had been resolved, so I phoned back. BTW – don’t bother with their convenient “call back” service – it sucks and is still slower than waiting on hold (hey it’s an 0800).

When I initially reported the fault, I cried down the phone and told the poor sod about how I was likely to commit suicide and take some people with me. Evidently he made a note on my record because when I called again, the woman I spoke to treated me like she was working for the samaritans. She even told me that “If I could personally climb telephone poles I would – I’m so sorry”. Not only that, but within 20 minutes we had an engineer here! On a saturday! The poor bastard ended up spending 2 hours tracing our line from the hole in the wall right back to the exchange using his little osc/amp setup. Every manhole inbetween had to be taken up and it turned out to be down to the engineer who installed the line in the first place…who forgot to tell the exchange that he’d re-routed the line to another pair…nice bloke, but what a twat.
However, I have to say that getting everything back in order within 2 hours of making a call really does make me feel better about the UK and really makes me want to give “Helen” in cutomer services a great big passionate kiss. Thanks Helen.

Once the saviour had got us all back up, Michele and I went to Moonbow Jakes in Brockley to see Alex…who is about to go to Mexico for ever and ever…I have to say that it was one of the best afternoons I’ve had for years. We got to meet lots of people who all turned out to be really sound, lovely people. Been a while since I met anyone who I really liked, and today there were fucking millions of them! Nice one Alex – we’re all going to miss you.

We got home, appreciated Humph, ordered a curry and then watched Abigail’s Party (as a result of an earlier conversation). What a piece of brilliance that play is. It gets more difficult to watch each time and yet every actor becomes more accurate. It brought back old memories – Stacey and Ash – please get in touch – I miss you both.

Deja Vu! It took six fucking days to get our phone line switched on, despite the line being there already. We have a week of telephone service and then this morning – no dial tone. The helpful guy on 151 tells me it’s an exchange fault and they should be able to get it back up by monday…. MONDAY ?
WHAT?
My brain is in a troubled state at the moment and I’m clinging to any security blankets I can – ADSL is one of the few things that make me feel comfortable with the world. Sad, but true. Now, thanks to some fuckwit in our local exchange, we’ve got a “dry” weekend to look forward to. No working from home for me…nothing. I persuaded the guy to make it priority to limit the chances of me going postal.
As Michele said, it’s probably easier to get phone service in Iraq at the moment than to get a dial-tone with BT.

According to the propaganda, one of the reasons Blair and his lying, toadying, government were exonerated so fully from any blame in the Hutton report was “evidence” provided by the chair of the JIC: John Scarlett. He stood up and proudly lied through his teeth….for the good of the country of course. To understand how someone can lie so blatantly with such conviction you have to understand nationalism. I don’t, and I can’t, but I know enough about nationalists to know that they are simple lifeforms, who see life in very simple terms. Even faced with hard logical contradictions, thier adhesion to the simple rules of nationalism simplify such paradoxes. Just go with the option that appears to be more “patriotic”.
In the case of Captain John Scarlett it was easy. I can just imagine the meeting he will have had with the cabinet office and MI6:
C: Ah John – sorry about this but we need to talk to you about something of great importance….
Captain: You mean….ENGLAND ?
C: (Gravely) Yes. And her majesty’s government.
Captain: Her majesty ? Good god!
C: I’m afraid we’re going to have to ask you to lie about that bastard Kelly.
Captain: But Kelly was a fine man.
C: Remember…the security of ENGLAND is at stake…and Kelly was jeopardizing it.
Captain: England…I see. Well of course.
Cabinet-office-gopher: And we may be able to bung you a few bob too if you get Tony off the hook…

Instead of anything so crass as a bung in a brown envelope, the, very grateful, government have made him the new head of MI6.

Landlady.
After several days our previous landlady has been in touch with the bastards at the estate agents.Michele was surprised to hear she was unhappy with the state of the flat.I wasn’t.I look forward to her claim out of our deposit. We have already started planning the court case confident in the knowledge that we will win. Fuck you Camilla Fidelia Woollf (her real name) – I can only assume she is from aristocracy who have hit hard times….good. See you in court 🙂

The last blog was actually last night,but I only just got round to submitting it. Curse the space-bar on this keyboard – it needs at least 200 psi before it acknowledges being pressed.

Tonight was nice. A couple of pints of Guiness with Ian after work and then some wine back at our new flat. Humph wasso sweet and I suspect has a soft spot for Ian. Later on after Ian had left he decided to nest in my hair while I was at the computer.What an honour!

Again – time for bed. Happy birthday Ralph! Greetings to you all – especially Helen and Mike!

It’s been a while I know. But there are reasons. Firstly we didn’t have IP until very recently (it was hell).Secondly I have been through a very, very low period. There are many reasons for this that I don’t intend to go into but now we are in our new flat,things are beginning to look more normal.
Thirdly, I have actually written stuff but it’s a bit depressing and, to be honest, scares me when I read it.

So – starting afresh.

Had a birthday and it passed very quickly (thank god); I was asleep by 7pm.The Absinth I rejected turned up in a plastic glass, shoved between our window bars (basement flat in New Cross remember) with the words “you cannot escape the green goblin” scrawled on the side in eyeliner. I still have it, and how thanful I am that my brain was together enough to reject it at the time- despite allowing a tequila first…

BTW- there’s a mini supermarket along from New Cross station that sold me a tiramisu for 1.59 (UKP) that morning. Not only did this make a decent gift for the other Warmington slaves (a birthday tradition), but it was also one of the best Tiramisus I’ve ever tasted – second only to Tree’s, although in fairness hers was several orders of magnitude better…

Loads of other stuff went on recently that have provoked an emotional response, but I’ll discuss them later:

• Reading “The Funny Times” and realising that there are Americans out there who, rightly, feel more irritated with Wanker than anyone outside the country
• Seeing the predictible pictures of US and UK soldiers abusing Iraqis in a way that probably makes Saddam proud (P.S. despite what you might think, I don’t blame the soldiers….a topic for another time)
• The Space-bar going on this keyboard
• Blunkett storming ahead with the nextmove toward a police state

Goodnight