Who Do I Write Like?

I write like
David Foster Wallace

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Oh really?

Lib Dem Cracks

"Now the Lib Dem deputy leader has been on the Politics Show raising questions about the drastic cuts to the Building Schools for the Future programme.

I’m saying that it would be a nonsense to be taking money that could be used for improving existing schools, to create new schools where, on the ground, the will of the local community is for the existing schools to continue. So that’s a debate that’s going to continue.

Hydrocarbons in the air are more toxic than oil in the gulf...click to read more

It takes the smoggy Los Angeles region less than two days to match the pollution the Deepwater Horizon blowout produces in one, if you count the 4,740 tons per day of various emissions from combusted fossil fuel such as carbon monoxide, microscopic particles, nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds.

Worst-case estimates place the total oil spilled in the gulf at about 126 million gallons over two months. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates the country disgorges that much hydrocarbon pollution to the air in 10 days.

Lloyds Peak Oil Warning

Lloyds are hardly tree huggers. wonder how the ignorant "skeptics" will react to this.

Haiti Displaced clinging to the Edge

No jokes about U2 please....


"PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Hundreds of displaced families live perilously in a single file of flimsy shanties planted along the median strip of a heavily congested coastal road here called the Route des Rails."

Guatemala nearly went narco

GUATEMALA CITY — For a 17-day period that ended last month, Guatemala seemed to be falling under the direct control of suspected mobsters. A lawyer leading a posse of unsavory characters became the attorney general and started dismantling the state's legal apparatus...

Robber Barons

no-one could have predicted the IMF coming in and actually supporting the new Labour approach to running the economy - but that's exactly what happened this week:

"In a rebuff to David Cameron's avowed intention to start repairing the public finances as soon as this spring's election is over, the Washington-based IMF said the fragility of the global economy meant stimulus packages should be left in place well into 2010."

The way this government are intent on dismantling the country's infrastructure reminds me of the behaviour of certain equity companies and their asset stripping style of management. In the way that we reaped the reward for thatcherism in the 90s and 2000s - out of control banks, no control of utlilities companies, ongoing housing crisis, millions on the employment scrap heap, and entreched permanent under-class, high urban crime, huge difference in life expectations of rich and poor, a no-hope attitude among the young, not at all fit for purpose education system, etc etc. then we will reap the reward for this in the next 20/ 30 years as our infrastructure continues to crumble and rot while large mega corporations run away with public money, and US investors suck the life out of the few remaining British companies. We're fucked. With this govermnent, doubly so.

Our current crisis was caused by the private sector and not enough public sector regualation. Most of us at the time realised this and thought that capitalism as we know may be over for ever. Now the right seems to have gained control despite a public shift to the left - they really didn;t want the Tories, with Murdoch support, an expensive campaign, and a truly awful incumbent Labour government, people still didn;t want to vote tory, however thanks to the traitorous Lib Dems we have the most right wing tory government we've ever had - and the right are intent on reducing or destroying the part of the economy that saved us and build up the part that nearly, and maybe still will, caused us to sink.

The Tories will blame New Labour for this - and while I hate New Labour for their refusal to challenge the status quo set by the tories - I can't see that they are the root cause of any of this. If anything their policy was to make the wealthy, mega-wealthy, having attracted them into the UK, and syphoning off a teeny tiny amount of this wealth to funnel to those not quite at the bottom, - for them it made living in a shit broken country with no opportunity just about tolerable, that and the ballooning consumer and celebrity culture. but there was nothing for the very poor, and nothing for the talented and bright who didn't just want money as a reward.

The US Helping Al Qaida Gain Foothold In Yemen

US bombing will be Al Qaida's most powerful recruiting tool.

"The missile had struck in one of the most remote and inaccessible valleys on earth, in a place where Al Qaeda has been trying to establish a foothold. Quso was the local cell leader and had been recruiting young men for years. Ahmed knew him well.

I met Ahmed several weeks later in Sana, the Yemeni capital, where he works part time as a bodyguard. By that time, Al Qaeda's Yemeni branch had claimed credit for a failed effort to detonate a bomb in a Detroit-bound jetliner on Christmas Day, igniting a global debate about whether Yemen was the next front in the war on terror. Yemen's once-obscure vital statistics were flashing across TV screens everywhere: it is the Arab world's poorest country, with a fast-growing and deeply conservative Muslim population of 23 million. It is running out of oil and may soon be the first country in the world to run out of water. The central government is weak and corrupt, hemmed in by rebellions and powerful tribes. Many fear that Al Qaeda is gaining a sanctuary in the remote provinces east of Sana, similar to the one it already has in Afghanistan and Pakistan."

This Week

Some really good news - at least for now - BBC6Music appears to have been saved. So I can listen now without that nagging feeling of depression in the back of my mind, wondering how long I have before this, one of my last great pleasures in life, finally disappears for ever. If the BBC is serious about making it's legacy of unmatched archive material public, then it will need 6Music as one of its outlest - BBC4 on tv and 6Music on the radio.

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More fox related hysteria

I wonder how far down the league table of risks to children foxes really sit - somewhere near the bottom, under cars, own parents, electricity, gas, kettles, stairs, friends, shoe laces, plastic toys and undercooked food, I would have thought - so I would stamp out all those others before thinking about foxes.

And now about me...

My face went almost back to normal this week. I had to see the dentist on Thursday as the infection seemed to have spread to the area around a tooth that partially cracked a while back.

I was in agony three nights running - why does tooth pain kick in at night - the misery zone for me was midnight to about 3/4 am. then I was fine by about 8/9 am except for lack of sleep. Boss is understanding though and is letting me come in any old time. Now on anti-biotics, but still feel groggy. Appointment for having tooth out is still over a week away.

Only response from my police complaint so far is a letter confirming my intial report and a call from a victim of crime counsellor. Now if there are cuts to be made surely we can start with these useless tossers. I'm sure that in quite serious cases they can be helpful but I've had them call me up after reporting minor burglaries and the theft of my bicycle. Yes you can help by finding my fucking bike - short of that - piss off and get a real job!!!

This Week

Thank God the football crap is over - I know there's still matches and that - but all the England nonsense is over. We should do what Nigeria has done - suspend the team for being useless...though not for a mere two years. I reckon if we were ever going to make a come back as a footballing nation we would have done it by now. better to concentrate on something else I reckon, like making solar panels or windfarms. Engineers could be the new over paid pin ups - which would be fairer as girls can be engineers.

I started the week as a healthy confident human being and ended it as a physical and mental wreck. On Wednesday - early into work for a change - a fat bald violent tosser jumped out of his car in Bermondsey, pushed me off my bike, kicked the bike and then punched me in the face.

I reported it to the police and got taken to a walk in centre at whitechapel. I have to say that the policeman and all the medical people - espeically the ambulance crew - were all absolutely marvellous. The motorbike copper did try to find the guy after he'd driven off with his young daughter but my description was a bit out. it did all come back to me but too late for the initial search...though as a witness saw his number plate - the police do know where he lives.

I had a great chat with the ambulance people - didn;t get their names - but they bent over backwards to see I got treatment, and quickly. I guess they were concerned I might be concussed. Don't think I was - though I was a bit stunned.

Received 5 stitches from lovely nurse and then cycled into work as if nothing happened.

It was the next day I really started to feel it. I just felt groggy, and a throbbing unrelenting pain kept up. My face is still all puffed up so I can barely eat. Only beer makes everything OK. Really worried this weekend that the swelling will get out of control though if anything it's slightly better for first time this morning.

While I am getting some funny looks no-one I know is mentioning it - even though it is pretty bloody obvious.

The Bastards Won't Give Up

They've been told to stop harrassing photographers but London's police are a law unto themselves.



Read this article from the Independent

Forget the communist bloc, China, Libya, Saddam's Iraq, North Korea - human rights are being violated every day in the UK - by the UK's own police force.

This footage is brilliant - they accuse the photographer of everything from pedaephilia to being an agitator and a terrorist threat to the military parade, and finally after they've tried taking his camera away and used threats to make him leave the area, they push him down some stairs and finally arrest him for breach of the peace. It's fucking marvellous and shows what ignorant thugs the Met police really are. Well done the photographer - only young - for knowing his rights and standing his ground.

To Do or die

My To Do list has become my personal albatross. I have now got very good at capturing everything I think of - things I need to, things I'd like to do, things I have thought of that may or may not be possible or worth having a go at. I use this laptop - the excellent post it note programme - so I've got 40 or 50 virtual post it notes stuck on my screen; I use a voice recorder in case I think of anything while on my bike; and any scribbled notes i make eventually find their way to the top of the pile to be typed onto a virtual post it note, or website favourites, or whatever other way I can store my intent without actually getting anything done. Now I have such a mountain of these notes I have to prioritise - so there's a "I have to do today" list, and "things i'd like to do" list, and "a next month when I get paid" list, etc. As well as that - books I want to read, films to see, records to buy, etc. etc.

Since I've been using Twitter I now have a list of Tweets I need to go back and check out, and my bookmark file is huge, I have hundreds of pdfs downloaded from Guardian stories i'm interested in, a hard drive full of scanned notes and articles.

In the words of Morrissey - something is squeezing my skull - and yes it is being squeezed by the weight of failed intentions, and guilt of good ideas going unrealised, books and articles left unread and fear that my cultural life is more mediocre than it should be & by the discrepency between what i intend to do and what i actually get done - in short that I am failing as a 21st Century human being. This gap my intention deficit, if you like - it is already big , and getting bigger....the true malaise of the modern world as we have systematically thrown out the filters of the media and the critic, and the retailer and taken on board the gargantuan task of sifting through all incoming data ourselves. Oh for the days of just sitting down in front of C4 News once a day, having the NME decide my music shopping list for me, letting the local flea-pit decide what films I see, my boss decide my work-load, the shoe-box under the bed being the only repository for my meagre collection of non-digital photo prints, and only having my diary to write in, with noone to read it.

This Week (only partially complete)

I started the week exhausted. Attempting to run 10km round London fields in a dress and tights on Saturday left me knocked sideways. For someone who hasn't run for about 15 years it was probably a foolhardy challenge to take-up. In the end I just ran the bits where there were lots of spectators, and, confidentially, didn't go the whole distance. I ducked out a couple of laps short - my feet felt absolutely awful. Click on the thumbnail to the left here with caution - but it does show well what I cannot adequately describe. I ended up hobbling home after drinking in the pub until 9pm.

Sunday was recovery day - I could barely walk - and Monday - well I could barely walk then either but my cycling muscles appeared not to have been particularly stretched...and pushing pedals was the one thing I could do with my feet without causing excrutiating pain. I was hobbling about in th office in just socks for most of the afternoon.

The I found out that poor old Frank Sidebottom had died, which put an instant downer on the week....there was that awful and vindictive budget designed to rob the poor to pay the bankers..the week went downhill from there.

Wednesday I had to call the police on a couple of chavs (not a nice word but it surely applies in this case) who tried to run me down in their white van and then threatened violence upon me; Thursday I took the details of a Sainsburys lorry in Charlton which nearly took me out after not respecting my right of way, and finally later I was nearly taken out by a suited gentleman driving at me on the wrong side of the road in Holborn. My friend P had a friend die

on Wednesday in a car crash and a collegue hospitalised on Tuesday in a separate crash.

And it's been hot - I don't do well in this sort of heat. Haven't slept well, felt uncomfortbale at work; but on the positive side I appear to have lost a bit of weight.

Friday I was so exhausted I fell asleep watching "8 legged Freaks" at 6 in the afternoon, and again later watching Mighty Boosh extras. I must have slept for about 14 hours in all.

(picture on right --> not at all related to post, but topical)

Frank Sidebottom is Dead, oh yes he is, he really is.

It is with absolute shock that I report the death Britain's greatest ever papier-mache-head-based comedian/musician.

I first became aware of his work in 1985 - a session for Radio One and the release of his first ep. Then the sci-fi ep at Christmas.

I still have my copy of Frank's firm favourites, and it still makes me laugh. Actually Frank was a bit of a git - selfish, lazy and arrogant at times; he had a fearsome temper especially when Little Frank was around; and god knows what he was doing still living with his mum at his age. but through it all he managed to produce unique versions of classic songs especially ones about space and sci fi.

Who can forget his moving version of "Life On Mars" - about the girl with a mouse in her hair - or his better than the original version of "Bohemian Rhapsody". ..better mainly becasue he managed to do the whole thing in less than 2 minutes.

In the 90s I saw him many times at festivals where I think he found a niche filling in for last minute cancellations, which is I think why I ended up seeing him three days running at the 1993 Reading Festival.

His career ground to a halt soon after that - i think it may have been over-exposure. However the last few years saw a comeback, and a new tv show, and for the first time the beginnings of widespread recognition thanks to his now famous former cohorts - Mark Radcliffe, Jon Ronson and Mrs Merton.

He once sang that he didn;t want to die and end up like Anita Dobson. Unfortunately that has now happened. Chris Sievey, the man inside the papier mache head; I hope you rest in peace, oh yes I do, I really do. Thankyou.

Click Here for Radio Timperly

The Great Drag Race

This is me on the left - in my outfit before turning up at the first ever Great Drag Race on London fields, Hackney, for Prostate Cancer Research.

My look - a black dress from Asda, yellow coat from Sainsbury and lacey tights from somewhere else. I turned up "in costume" which was fun - I had one bloke giving me a funny look and practically turned white when I said "right mate" to him.

Though not in the picture I wore black high heel boots to begin with - and they absolutely killed my feet - I can hardly walk now. Then I ran - which made things worse.

This is the world record attempt at dancing in drag - look, you can see me - trying to follow the actions in my own hapless way. I believe that we doubled the old record. but I'm awaiting confirmaiton on that.

Lads turned up en masse - over a hundred and fifty - wearing ladies' clobber:

Now that you've seen my pics - please please please Give me some money

Tamar Bridge and my Dad

Built in late 50s/ early 60s linking Plymouth and Saltash in Cornwall. These pictures and over a hundred more, were in my Dad's archive - they are a unique record of Plymouth's iconic bridge being constructed and those who worked on it/

Unfortunately - the age of the photos mean that the colour has deteriotrated.
My Dad on the right. Aged about 18/ 19 here - one of his first ever jobs as an electrician.

Again - my Dad several years before I was born.

Construction in process

Foxes Attack (The Guardian, 08 Jun 2010, Page 5)

My own feelings are exactly as Terry Nutkins says below (there, I never thought I'd ever be publishing those words!). Foxes do not attack people - so what the feck happened? Years ago when I lived in colliers Wood I regularly discovered that my cats were happily intermingling with the foxes who lived at the bottom of my garden. They never ever attempted to approach me, my wife or my young step daughter when she was left alone in the garden. I once even saw a fox back away when confronted by a kitten. So - the question again - what the feck REALLY happened? This, unfortunately, can only be bad for foxes.

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Expert view
guardian.co.uk/ uk/ commentisfree ree
The Guardian
08 Jun 2010

Foxes are treating urban areas as their territory. They don’t differentiate between concrete and a tree, as both are part of their habitat. They are carnivores and opportunist feeders, but they don’t attack humans. I can’t remember a single verified...read more...

Tech Tags: The Guardian newspaper NATIONAL

What is With East London and Foxes?

Got Dragged into This...

The great drag race - it's to raise money for prostate cancer awareness and research.

Here's an artist's impression of how I'll look on the day.

Click on the link above if you wish to make a donation. Cheers!!

Another Wow Moment

A group of marine scientists at Brazil’s Guaruja Aquarium attached a plastic window to a shark’s egg so as to better observe the development of the embryo inside. A pretty astounding clip of the little swimmer follows below (and for those of you concerned about such things, the shark remained unaffected by the window):