Shins

It’s not often that your uncle John recommends music. The Shins new album is, however, a veritable box of delights - and popular in the US too apparently which is strange really...

An office that deals with post you might think...

Made a bit of a mistake today. Call me a naïve crazy fool if you like. I must just be out of touch – I carried a parcel to the post office and attempted to post it. Mad eh? I thought that even these days they might be able to handle that sort of thing. Obviously I was mistaken.

Thing is ‘Standard Parcels’ go up to 11kg. This one weighed 17kg. This means that though I can carry it ¼ of a mile to the post office the poor lamb who collects it won’t be able to carry it 10ft from the post office counter to his van. You’re supposed to ring them and they collect it. Do they turn up exactly when you want do you think or would I have to wait in all day? Any chance that it could all go wrong? Do I take a day off work so I can post a parcel I could walk down to the post office? I’VE BROUGHT IT IN TO THE POST OFFICE - JUST TAKE THE FUCKING PARCEL YOU MORONS.

Anyway, I explained briefly what I thought and the bloke took it off me and promised he’d try to persuade the pick-up driver to take it….then he told me the address was wrong. I told him his database was wrong. I’ve used the post office database before – it’s shit. In fact the Big Lottery Fund (who I used to work for) decided to trust the post office database rather than its staff as they kept adding (correct) addresses that weren’t on the database. In the end we had to use incorrect addresses that were in the database and hope that the neighbours would re-direct. Always nice to do a job right and be told by your employer that you’re not allowed to do that and they want it fucking up.

I did check the address with the company website and funnily enough they know their own address. It’s the same address they had last time I sent them a parcel – no, not Blue Sky Publications post office datashite idiots.

What a fucking shambles. I hate these people.

PS – that figure I was talking about earlier was just short of £10K. See you in court dudes.

Not April 1st then?

It wasn’t was it? The story that they’re spying on people in city centres via CCTV and then shouting at them to pick up their litter or stop their ‘anti-social behaviour’ – also via the CCTV. It really wasn’t on April 1st was it? Please tell me it’s a wind up.

Big rant coming!....maybe not as clearly argued as it could be because I’m apocalyptic with rage! (yes, I did say apocalyptic – it’s a joke, moron)


Amusing as it will be to see someone being shouted at for not binning an apple core, has anyone really thought this through? Do people really not mind being watched and told off by little Hitlers on the minimum wage for tiny social transgressions? People objecting to this will be criticised for being paranoid but didn’t millions of people die so we didn’t have to be spied on by the government and reported to ‘the authorities’ for petty ‘offences’? If I was to ask ‘how long will it be before you get hauled in for saying the wrong thing in the street’? you might think I was overreacting.

Thing is that no-one comes along and says ‘freedom will be abolished tomorrow’ so you can get angry about it – and the next group that get scape-goated won’t necessarily be those who have been used as an excuse before. It’ll start with an easy target. Maybe not even ‘hoodies’ or young hooligans. It’ll start with people you don’t like so you won’t care. Everyone can agree that racism is a bad thing for example so people will be prosecuted for making racist comments to a mate. Or for swearing too much. Or being sexist. Or Islamaphobic - or for dropping litter. It’ll ‘serve ‘em right’ you’ll say. Until the day that a minority Tory government needs the help of a few BNP MPs to hang onto power and a crack-down on 'anti-social elements' is ordered….or the owners of the precinct tell you that you can’t walk on their expensive bit of pavement unless you buy something because its only fair; or because there’s been a terrorist atrocity and all swarthy looking young men are rounded up or….

The thing is it doesn’t matter who is being targeted (just hope it isn’t you! – but you won’t know it is until its too late) The point is that once the structure of the totalitarian state is in place it only needs a government under pressure of one sort or another (crime, recession, strike, war on terror, whatever) and suddenly BANG! It’s all gone.

Do you want to be constantly watched and listened to? Do you want to be fingerprinted and scanned and barcoded and have your life tracked by the government? Do you want to have to prove you’re not a ‘criminal’ every day, do you want to have to prove you’re ‘entitled’ to those ‘public services’ they keep going on about? Well, you cunts have already voted for this – it’s the ID card and its coming your way NOW not in some book you did at school once with pigs in.

In Soviet Russia they didn’t have political prisoners. Some people were ‘anti-social’ or ‘mentally disturbed’ because they didn’t believe in what the Party told them to.
In Nazi Germany they were only looking after the interests of ‘real’ Germans. Funnily enough, ‘anti-social elements’ were blamed for anything that went wrong.
In modern Western democracies people don’t get put into secret prisons without trail and of course we don’t torture anyone. People will only be watched for legitimate reasons like protecting us from the marauding bands of paedophiles or terrorists that kill hundreds of us every day (unlike car drivers say).

And freedom is safe.

Well, it’s not. Thin end of wedge…country going to dogs…too late before you know it etc. etc. Yes I know what this sounds like…

I am not paranoid but I will be a citizen and not a subject. I will not register for an ID card and I will not be fingerprinted and iris scanned and turned into a criminal (though of course, I will. It'll be just that the laws will be criminal!). I’ve drawn a line in the sand – so there.

If you read my rant about the twat in the car park you may realise that I’d have rather abandoned the car and set fire to it than paid a tenner. Watching people all the time is out of order. Big Brother (or Community Support Big Brother as he is now called) ordering you to bin your apple core is fucking madness. Why is no-one angry about this?

Well, I’m getting tired out by all of this stuff. Line in sand drawn. If you or I end up in jail it’s them not us. Bastards.

A police state that started with 'good intentions' is still a police state. Remember Satanic Ritual Abuse anyone? It can happen here. It does happen here. Say no!

Net Ninnies

Today I was talking to an 'ex-colleague' about 'Net Nannies' - the things organisations have to prevent their staff being subjected to 'the language of the snooker hall'. He'd asked the IT department if they employ some some spotty oik to plough through the e-mails deciding whether it's OK to pass them on or that they must be censored. It turns out that they do!

I have a simple question - how can you be expected to contact the Council without using the word TWAT!?

Gas! Gas! Gas!

“British Gas have the lowest CO2 emissions of any major supplier.” I’m so glad they’re spending my money on telling us all. Presumably the hole in the ground they buy from has cleaner gas than the hole in the ground the others use. Either that or it’s a marketing stunt designed to sell us more gas or to tell us it’s OK to use gas because their gas is cuddly non polluting gas. Or maybe they just want to feel good about themselves or for us to love them.

Either that or they’re bunch of twats!

The only good marketing twat is a DEAD marketing twat. I say gas ‘em all. Since the gas is so clean and friendly it could take ‘em ages to die! Sad.

On the Amazon

For reasons too boring to go into I recently wanted to buy some 'Pen Drives' / 'Memory sticks' / 'whatever silly name they haves'.

Co-incidentally, I got an advert from Amazon. I followed the link. They had some 2 Gigabyte ones at £6.34. I decided to buy three of them. This comes to £19.02 with free postage (I thought).

I was wrong. The postage they wanted was £17.86. Really! I weighed the 'Flash Drive' I already have. It weighed 15 grams. So three would weigh 45 grams. I thought it was a mistake and queried it. I was told that it was OK because they were selling them on behalf of another company (like they make their own books in the cellar?) though they did admit that they set the postal rate. So, instead of charging me the postage at 84p (which would get me double the weight posted) they wanted to steal another £17 from me.

Anyway, I try not to do business with shysters and crooks so I'm not using our Amazonian friends any more. I feel strangely 'empowered', though I'm getting sick of being wound up by these kind of people. I'm quite relaxed when not being wankered by badgers (or is it badgered by wankers? whatever).

I sent them the message below (no swearing now, that makes them slime onto high horses where they clearly have no right to be. In fact they hardly have a right to be mucking out the high horses. They should in fact be helping the advertising guys eat the high horses pooh - or poo if you prefer, never been sure about the spelling here).

anyway, here's my heroic message for which I'd like some credit please...

Hello. I just made a query about your postal prices. I got an answer quickly so that was quite good. It didn't however explain why you were charging £17.86 for a weight that Royal Mail would send for 84p (3 flash drives that weigh approximately 15g each - small packet rate) This is comically outrageous and I will tell everyone I can about it as quickly as I can, principally via my blog but also in person. Sorry but I don't have 'mug punter' tatoo-ed on my forehead just yet! Yours a quite angry but also amused John Parkes

MY MY MY Passport

Did you know that your passport is supposed to be the 'property' of 'the Crown' or the state or somesuch. Seems they can take it back if they want like it was some special favour being allowed out. Those of us who refuse to sign up for a snoop card (the ID card containing all your microchipped private details which the government 'will never abuse') will no doubt have theirs confiscated.

Well, I say it's my passport and you're not having it! The arrogance of the bastards! I've had this 'privilege' attitude before from some arsehole at Dover years ago who thought he was doing me a big favour letting me off a boat into Dover (of all places).

I think I'm turning into an anarchist Anarchism incidentally is, in my experience, just an excuse posh kids use so as not to have to pay their share of the gas bill - but that's another story. You write a nice letter to their parents and get a cheque by return of post - remember to exaggerate the amount...

Come on then Yerfuckkkurs!

It's about time I broke a proper legal agreement I think. It was signed by myself, my former employer and a solicitor. The solicitor incidentally charged £400 for a 10 minute phone call during which they read out the agreement (which I'd read).

Anyway, I got made redundant last year. I got a redundancy payment the details of (and probably the existence of) I am legally obliged to keep secret. The agreement didn't say who I could tell, if anyone but I'm sure it must have said not to mention the Big Lottery Fund or the fact that they stole money from the pension fund to pay redundancy money to the staff they'd shafted when they centralised operations.

It may not be very exciting to you but LIVE LAW BREAKING HERE ON-LINE NOW is quite exciting.

By the way 'BIG' (as they like to be called) - I'm not giving you the money back because I spent it on guitars! - On whihc I write songs slagging the likes of you off!

YES!!!

Too Late for International Rescue

You may have been wondering what’s been happening on 'the swimming pool front' recently. The answer is ‘not a lot, really’. However, I did go to the ‘International Pool’ in Leeds again recently. With it being convenient for buses and city-centre workers to use in their dinner hour and with swimming being good for the ‘obesity agenda’ or whatever they call it, and with fitness generally being a good thing, and with drowning in muddy ponds a bad thing, what do you think they should do with it?

I know….close the fucker down and build a new one - in Middleton! The office workers can do a brisk 15 minutes walk to the bus stop, wait ten minutes for a bus, spend 40 minutes on the bus to Middleton, go swimming and be back in Leeds in time to go home. Brilliant! Or maybe the new pool will be mainly patronised by the teenage Mums of Middleton? – course it will! No more fat kids in Middleton then. Victory for the Council.

I’d just like to make a quick prediction here – that the financial worries about the new place will start in about 18 months to 2 years time. I’d just like to say ‘I told you so’ here and now. Let’s hope a big slum-of-the-future office block with a really stupid name is built on the site of the International Pool instead. A place where no-one really lives or a place where people do pretend jobs in ‘finance’ or something. There’ll be lots of security though so that’s good.

Go Harehills!

The Leeds minicab drivers’ competition is really hotting up. It’s all been a bit low-key and secretive so far but it’s obviously about to 'break big’. I’m afraid I can’t tell you exactly how it’s organised or how it’s scored but it’s pretty clear that it follows one of two main themes:

either

1. Breaking as many traffic regulations as possible

or

2. Breaking as many rules in the Highway Code as possible

I guess you earn points for breaking as many rules / regulations as possible in the shortest possible time. Or perhaps it’s the total over a set period? The Holy Grail would be breaking a huge number in a single manoeuvre. It looks like there’s a weighted scoring system in operation so most drivers are going for a combination of approaches.

Tell you one thing though, the mini-cab drivers of Harehills PISS over the opposition. They are going to WIN, no contest.

Wonder what the prize is?

For whoooom are you sorry!?

Before she dies I thought I'd admit that on occasion I feel sorry for Margaret Thatcher.

I mean, you put in all that effort and end up with two comedy children...

...and I'm thinking of her real children here not the 'New Labour' Millipede brothers and the rest.

Small Victories

Turns out the staff in Sound Control don’t think I’m mad. This cheered me up (see previous) They sounded like they agreed that the parking attendant at the Aireside Shopping Centre shouldn't be allowed to prevent me from leaving the carpark on foot after him and his mate have spied on me, 'warned' me and demanded £10. Too many bad memories to repeat this.

Anyway, after visiting Sound Control I had to walk across the crossing at the notorious ‘steaming through the red light like an arsehole’ junction. There was a women waiting to cross on the same side as me and 4 people on the other side. The lights changed, the cars carried on, the green man came on and 6 people stepped onto the crossing – the arseholes in cars were forced to stop! – Victory! People power, no violence necessary and arseholes who drive like arseholes forced to back down!

Incidentally, these are my favourite phrases to shout at drivers driving across pedestrian crossings when you've got the right of way. They both avoid use of the word 'fucking' or 'cunt'.

They are

1. 'Am I getting in your way?'
2. 'Is it the wrong shade of red for you?'

I also recommend walking in the middle of the road when some twat has parked their car in the middle of the footpath. Fair swap I reckon. Bit dangerous but hey, doing the right thing can be!

Toot toot.

Have I said this before?

I might have done this one. But....if you want an excellent definition of a 'deprived' area its anywhere you see an adult riding a kid's bike.

I guess you could make this a more sophisticated 'modelling tool' (in some people's lives this is nothing to do with a hobby shop or knives of any kind by the way). You could add...

1. Are they standing up?
2. Do they have a dirty white jacket?
3. and baseball cap?
4. Apparently moving as far sideways as forwards?
5. Are they riding diagonally across a dual carriageway?

Well, I haven't got time to develop the idea but if it's all the above its a very deprived area. Incidentally, what you do with a deprived area is this...

1. Take out a million pounds in tax and lottery tickets
2. Give 5% of it to a variety of 'regeneration initiatives' and organisations to spend on having meetings with each other.
3. Make the residents jump through hoops and fill in forms to get tiny grants they must account for.
4. Make the representatives of the regeneration initiatives write reports to ensure they're 'accountable to the public'. This must say either a) We've done something useful, honestly; or b) 'Gosh its complicated, its not all that easy to fix' is it?
5. Continue to redistribute wealth to the rich.
6. Wring hands and / or crack down on the poor scum you've just shafted once again.
7. Remember to make the poor people account for that £5,000!

Something Informative to Try

Here's an idea....

1. Buy a MacDonald’s
2. Take it home
3. Put it on a plate

Ridiculous isn’t it?

Just looks wrong. Doesn’t even pretend to look like food.

...and wasn't their advertising from a few months back fantastic? - all those happening chicks chatting cappuccino salad. I went in and asked after them as is my wont. Enough said...

'Stealth Taxes' A History

Na then....

Long ago the Tories (as well as dealing with Apartheid, housing foreign powers' WMD, using the police as their private army, putting everyone on the dole for a crackpot economic theory and the rest) decided that 'indirect taxes' like VAT were 'a good thing' because we had 'the choice' whether we paid them or not. This of course only worked for people who could choose whether or not to spend their money (i.e. those with a lot of it); the rest of us just paid more tax to give to rich people as an incentive to 'invest' (in the Cayman Islands). Indirect taxes are 'regressive' i.e. they distribute money from the poor to the rich (New Labour didn't invent it you know). That's why they liked them.

This was in the days of course when there were politicians (even parties) who seemed to disagree with shafting the poor and even mentioned 'equality' once in a while (it's still in the dictionary, just don't look in the New Labour dictionary). Anyway, what I want to know is when did the indirect taxes they love become 'stealth taxes' and something that was 'bad'. Funny bunch politicians really aren't they?

Sorry, it's more of a history question really isn't it?

More Buses

Having accused 'Firstbus' of racking up fares by 10% a year, someone at work reminded me that it was less than 2 years ago when the fare into town was 80p. It's now £1.40 (hey, could be £1.50!) What's that then, about 45% a year worth of fare 'changes'? It's now loads cheaper to drive 2 (never mind more) people into town than it is to go on the bus.

Why do the government talk about 'green issues' when their transport policy is very clear - 'Buy a car, stand in traffic' It is their fault because they didn't do anything to reverse the 'free market' (i.e. private monopoly) in buses when the bus companies were going to be racing each other into town cutting fares all the while with that lovely Tory logic that we'e all now supposed to believe in.

First Bus

I think I've worked out the fare increases (or 'changes' as they like to call them) that First Bus use. They put the fares up on ordinary tickets by about 10% every 18 months. They also put up the cost of passes and pay in advance fares about 10% every 18 months but not , of course, at the same time. So, in a couple of weeks the 'First Seven' ticket goes up to £14. It was £10 in 2003 if I remember rightly. That's 40% in 4 years. Remind me what inflation was over the same period? Oh 2 and a bit percent eh?

Either they're providing us with a service thats worth half as much again as it was less than 4 years ago or they're a bunch of rip-off bandits. Not only that, but the head of First Bus is an anti-gay campaigner and one of those business types that New Labour want to 'influence the curriculum' in 'city academies.

Sometimes I really hope there is a Hell.

The Green Man

No, not a pub. that traffic light thing....again.

I was in Leeds the other day with a small child who is just learning how to cross the road properly. We crossed the road at pedestrian crossings several times during the course of the afternoon. Not once, thats NOT FUCKING ONCE were there less than two cars driving through the crossing after the green man came on. So, how do you teach that to a small child?

Teach the child that people in cars are cretins I guess and you should put bricks through their windows as part of the 'Respect Agenda'. Why do pedestrians not retaliate. I decided not to use my best Doc Welly foot due to the presence of said small child.

On the way home I watched the cars making illegal left turns off Roundhay Road into Harehills Lane. I was on the bus or I would have tried to stop them. I'd have asked them in a quiet, determined and hopefully malevolent way whether it was the arrows painted on the road, the multiple 'no left turn' signs or the pedestrian crossing with the green man showing that they felt least comfortable ignoring. Then I'd have crushed their car by dropping a house on it.

They really believe in recycling you know

Leeds City Council really believe in waste recycling you know. Why, we've even got a green bin.

They left a leaflet the other day saying that among other items it was OK to use the bin for paper and plastics number 1,2 + 4.

Within a week they put a big sticker on the top of the green bin saying that as far as paper and plastic were concerned it was only OK to put 'newspapers and magazines' and 'plastic bottles' in.

Simple question really - can you put paper and plastics 1,2 + 4 in or not? - Stupid fuckers.

I presume that the Council is relatively free of sleaze and corruption (except for 'HR' of course) if only because they CAN'T GET THEIR STORIES STRAIGHT!

A Word on Net Nannies

I may have mentioned this before but did you know that people who work for Councils never swear. Nor have they ever heard swearing. Either that or they've heard too much.

Whatever, someone chooses a list of words they aren't allowed to read and sets up an email system to block them. Someone who is being paid at your expense chooses a list of rude words that must be blocked. I say someone, I assume its actually a series of meetings. The Profanity Working Group or somesuch. Do they have seperate agenda items for 'cunt' and fuck' - or maybe they need the discussion time for 'stupid arseholes wasting their lives and our money on shite wastes of time - and money'?

Still, Council employees can spend hours helping you work out which rude words will get through. Scunthorpe anyone? (Hint, there's a 'cunt' in it!)

You were caught on camera leaving the car-park...

Hey, I admit it. I did a very bad thing the other day - I left a car park. I was seen by a man with a camera who is employed, presumably, to watch for people erm, leaving the car park – which is just not allowed!

The Aireside ‘shopping centre’ in Leeds is having a crackdown. The deal is that you get free parking for an hour if you use the shops in the centre. Well, strangely I don’t have a particular problem with that. However, should you wish to combine a visit to the shops with the act of ‘leaving the car park’ then you’re in trouble. £10 to pay if you 'leave the car park'. So….if you have a look in Sound Control and they don’t have what you want and you decide to nip off to the bank, or if you decide to buy a £2,000 suite from MFI and need to nip to the building society to sort out the money or if you decide just to have a quick walk round then no way!

The man with the camera takes your registration number. If he sees you 'leave the car park' he calls the man at the barrier and the man at the barrier won’t let you out of the car park until you pay £10. They’re giving final warnings at the moment, keeping registration numbers on file. They’ll certainly be watching me if I go back.

Here’s my plan – this is a serious one not involving flame throwers or undue violence of any kind. I’m going to walk out of the car park. Then I’m going to come back in and buy something from Sound Control. That way I’ll have fulfilled my side of the bargain in that I’ll have used the shops in exchange for free parking. So, if they want to charge me £10 it’ll be purely for ‘leaving the car park’. I shall wave my receipt at Corporal Snicklegruber in the booth. If he doesn’t let me out then I really do turn into Michael Douglas in ‘Falling Down’ and the flamethrower comes out.

Sad fact is that men with security cameras who watch you and then tell you where you can and can’t go isn’t a surprising thing ‘these days’. Too many people will not be outraged but just go ‘ho-hum, yeah, that’s what it’s like these days.’ So, human rights, freedom of movement or ‘revenue protection’. Do I need to tell you which way modern society has chosen?

I’m reading Winston Churchill’s History of the Second World War at the moment. The man is currently revolving in his grave. He was Prime Minister you know. Involved in a big war for a concept called 'freedom', a world where you wouldn't be pushed around by idiots for no good reason, where you wouldn't be watched 24 hours a day. No-one gives a toss about it now of course, all quaintly old fashioned when there's moisturiser to buy (though not in the Airside shopping centre, one of its few advantages). "Never in the car park of human bureaucratic pettiness were so many pissed off so much by so few" - if only they were pissed off! Maybe that's unduly pessimistic, maybe a riot is brewing and the camera will be torn up and shoved up the arse of the person whose great idea this is.

Thing is that I'm going to be abandoning the car at the barrier and people are going to get pissed off with ME! I'm incoherent with rage and it hasn't happened yet!

Shopping List

Shoe polish, a pant whirler and bird fat...

Very occasionally I enjoy a shopping list (so long as it only involves visiting a maximum of 2 shops)

I also bought a copy of the ‘Christmas Books’ by Charles Dickens for £1.99. So I guess there is another side of the Chinese tat story….hate to admit it though.

Crazy Pants Day

I was sworn to secrecy but I'm afraid I'm going to let 'the cat' out of 'the bag' early.

You see, for a small part of the world, tomorrow is 'Crazy Pants Day'! One has to wear (over one's normal clothes) one's 'favourite or most interesting pants'.

I'll be getting my current (and particularly ex) colleagues to do this.

The world, one feels, should do this kind of thing more often and perhaps lay off bribing Arabs to buy guns.

Mice Pace

I like the idea of the pace mouse doing a few laps in the mouse Olympics - and doing a few Lapps in the hotel later I'll be bound - can't trust these over paced mice you know. Over paced, over furred, over experimented on, overrunning everywhere like vermin - pigeons without wings they call them, you know (of course you do) or is that rats? They like the girls in fur from cold countries. They should hold the event in a country where nothing ferments, it's bound to help. This might mean the moon or somewhere, but they don't have a mouse Olympics or a mouse Olympic team and they're not a country so why bother?

But our subject was mice pace not pace mice....

I have a mice pace page. It's against the law to do music and not have one you know. I'm not sure about all this 'friends' stuff though meself. I make a point only to have enemies and lovers - and yes, I am going to use that line in a song so don't you touch it.

You can find 'me' at www.myspace.com/johnparkesmusic Someone had taken John Parkes, presumably to flog it to me later. That's the Spanish for you though eh? Actually, I have nothing against the Spanish despite their not understanding the concept of cheese and tomato sandwich - why should they?

I'm going to put some music on there (top of a mouse? the moon? Spain? myspace? - you decide) at some point. You can be my 'friend' on there if you want - and if I let you. Good to do something just as people get fed up with it all though eh?

Another thing to figure out -eh?

Three Buffalos

I can only think of three bands with ‘Buffalo’ in them (that's in their names of course, unless you know anyone who had an actual buffalo in the band, mind you the Ukrainians came close...)

These are:

Buffalo Springfield
Buffalo Tom
Grant Lee Buffalo

So there, you go. Point made I think – all bands with ‘Buffalo’ in their name are great! Difficult to do if you’re from Donny though I guess…

Yer man Bill from Buffalo Tom has a new band, though your man Chris from Buffalo Tom was a nice man / cool guy so I hope he’s got a new band too. I changed strings for them for a week or so back in th’eighties. They were supporting the Wedding Present. Keith from the Weddoes had a theory that the bill was always in the opposite order (not Bill, the bill) and that the best band on a night was always on first. Another point well made…he disappeared to Australia you know...

Actually Works? - Too Square Daddio!

Seems I gave the secret away re my e-bay purchase. I didn’t even get the one I bid on but I am now the proud owner of a chrome-plated Dunlop tyre pressure gauge. It was made in England. It was made in the late 1960’s and it ACTUALLY WORKS. Not only does it work but it will probably work in 100 years time if it’s looked after.

It isn’t made of plastic, it didn’t come from China via the pound shop, it’s not digital, it doesn’t need batteries, it JUST FUCKING WORKS! It’s an analogue instrument doing an analogue job. It doesn’t have fiddly bits and glued-on battery terminals and dodgy electrical connections and bits of wire that get caught in a battery compartment held ‘closed’ with impossibly small screws with heads that can be mangled by a screwdriver made of plasticine. It didn’t come in a blister pack with staples more hard wearing than the thing itself and it doesn’t have an instruction leaflet in 14 languages none of which make sense to their respective readers. It does come in a metal container with a screw lid.

It comes from a time when things were relatively more expensive. People didn’t have so many things – but the things they did have ACTUALLY WORKED and you only needed to buy one every couple of generations, not every fucking couple of weeks. People got paid decentish wages for making them and they only had to be delivered a few dozen miles to the shop or garage – and there was one of those every few miles where you could find a mechanic WHO COULD ACTUALLY FIX CARS WITHOUT NEEDING A NEW COMPUTER CHIP IMPORTED FROM THE FAR EAST.

I paid about £7 for it as it was ‘collectable’ – They didn’t even bother to advertise it as ‘useable’. Perhaps useable just doesn’t sell – why have useable when you can have buzzword / digital? I could have paid £1.49 from Argos or somewhere (for a ‘digital’ one, see above) – and then another £1.49 a couple of uses later and then another a couple of times after that. That’s what we’re supposed to do now isn’t it? – To keep us shopping for cheap tat that doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do – but, hey, it’s cheap.

What if you’re in the highlands somewhere in the snow and you need something you can actually rely on? Well, you’d be waiting for a computer chip controlled satellite guided tow truck with a starting button made with cheap plastic to not arrive wouldn’t you?

Am I a grumpy old man? – Too right I am! I want to buy things to do a job they can actually do. Why is this so hard to understand? Why isn’t there open revolt?

An Exciting Thing - No, really

More on this later but today's exciting thing is that I'm bidding on a 'proper' tyre pressure gauge on e-bay. This relates to me being grumpy, British industry, China, my dad and the over technologising of EVERYTHING. Oh and Argus too (or is it Argos?) who cares. Oh, and Halfords and every shop in the world come to think of it, and ironically the 'cars only' policy currently being rigidly being enforced (as opposed to the talk policy which is green and 'sustainable')

There's a free copy of my album to the person who predicts what my moan is and what my excitement is all about. It's not difficult.

Exquisite Taste

There was a programme on the telly the other night about the Beatles ‘Love’ thing. I hadn’t realised that it was (quite liderally) a tossing circus.

They decided to represent John Lennon's mother being run over and killed (this is the CIRCUS remember).

They did this in spectacular circus fashion by hitting a woman in red with a car and catapulting her into the roof on a trapeze - while pieces of car flew about.

I hope my death will be performed in the CIRCUS someday and in the same exquisite taste.

Shopping

Entirely predictable from me I know, but why is is that people do nothing but shopping in the run up to Christmas (as if there was anything to run up to by the way) and spend all their money - and then complain about it? Then after Christmas - they go SHOPPING!

Go to a shop when you need something you can't do without, buy the thing you can't do without and GO HOME!!

Shopping is shite, don't do it - it really is shite. All the shite people go shopping for shite in shite shiteing centres full of shite that people think they might want -but its all shite.

SHOPPING IS SHITE - DON'T DO IT!!!!

Eco Balls 2

Luckily, the leaflet just arrived from Powergen to explain how green they are – they’re ‘generating (great pun guys, I nearly split my sides) a sustainable future’. They produce mounds of this kind of junk mail. The philosophy seems to be that talking about stuff is the same as making it happen, which is of course how the modern world works (or fails to).

This is them on marine power:

“In 2005 we established a marine team to investigate how wave and tidal technology can help reduce carbon emissions and create a sustainable power supply for the future”

So, exactly what percentage of power does that mean you produce from waves then? – 0% by any chance? Still, never mind though eh, you’ve had a meeting.

Lovely glossy paper too, no expense spared. Bastards

Eco Balls 1

As Neil Young once said ‘A man needs a maid’ – helpfully adding ‘just someone to keep my house clean, fix my meals and go away’. Unfortunately, my maid makes me do the washing once in a while (and not Neil's best ever lyric we may agree).

With this in mind I bought some ‘Eco balls’ which wash your clothes without any powder (find out for yourself how they work). They're very clever and you should buy some. So there.

Death, Hell and Holidays

One way of looking at death is to see it simply as a reduction in thinking and feeling to the point where you’re not conscious of anything.

So, it’s really just like Christmas then.

Hell, on the other hand, is where you're constantly reminded of just how awful your situation is.

So, hell is just like Christmas too – but in Cleethorpes.
- note to the North East Lincs tourist people – you can use that one if you like.


Now, back in the mists of Blog I may have mentioned this before, but not only are death and Hell very similar, holidays these days are all the same. Anyone who ever had relatives with a desire to ‘go away for the weekend’ and a Hoseasons brochure will already know this, but if you decide that you want to do ‘something a bit different’ it’s actually not possible.

So, you decide to stay in ‘a log cabin’. What you get is a static caravan with the wheels taken off and the outside walls covered in plastic panels moulded with fake wood grain in 'half log’ shapes.

‘A tepee’ is the same static caravan with the wheels taken off, only with a plastic triangle erected over it (and forget any idea of it being round, or even square inside. It’s static caravan shaped.

A ‘castle’ meanwhile is a standard industrial unit with some plastic castle bits stuck on the front. A castle with a sloping steel roof and girders everywhere.

They’re all just off a major road, next to a golf course. You can always hear the traffic and there's nowhere to walk to.

These are real examples by the way. The ‘castle’ was called ‘Sherwood Castle Holiday Forest’ no less. You might think it’d be Sherwood Forest Holiday Castle but you’d be wrong. Not even Forest Castle Holiday Sherwood or Sharwood's Mild Castle Holiday in a jar.

As Damien Allbran and his mates once said - modern life is rubbish.

My Other Exciting Present

In my list of fab presents I forgot to mention that I'd been bought some blank video tapes. So, here goes....

I got some blank video tapes.

It's great being a top recording artiste.

Here's to the death of organised religion (and a slap for the disorganised ones)

Ho Ho Ho once more.

Ho Ho Ho

Much as it pains me to leave the 4-day party which is my rock and roll / acoustic Christmas (must do a Christmas album incidentally, chunky jumper et al), I thought it my duty to report in from the cutting edge of acoustic singer-songwriterdom to you little people who buy my records making my life so decadent and luxurious. You’re probably wondering what a top star such as myself gets bought for Christmas eh?

Well, here’s a short list of my favourite presents:

10 M&S white cotton hankies
1 drawstring laundry bad
1 purple party joke wig
1 turkey basting brush
2 pairs Matalan socks
1 Matalan sweatshirt
1 Matalan jumper (wool cycle, dry flat, re-shape while damp)

and a fucking partridge in a pear tree eh?

Ho Ho Ho!

WSM Gig

It'll probably kill the Whole Sky Monitor boys but we have decided to to 'a gig'. We do this about once a year if we can be arsed (please note, we might do more if someone paid us). It's at the New Roscoe at the junction of Roseville Road and Regent Street in Leeds on Wednesday 7th February. I'll look terrifically cool and forget some song words. No-one will notice, but some of our new songs are 'awesome'.

Christmas Weak

They were advertising a ‘race night’ at our local pub. I couldn’t decide whether to black up or go as a rabbi. In the event, the sight of a black rabbi betting on horses (which is what ‘race night' turned out to mean) upset some of the locals and I had to escape into Tescos.

A notice at Tescos tells me that a mobile phone is ‘the ideal way to keep in touch at Christmas’. I bought one and moved to a hotel for a week for an ‘ideal’ Christmas.

Well Done Mr Clayton

Well done to the James Clayton School of motoring for blatantly barrelling through the red traffic lights at the junction of Roundhay Road with Easterly Road on Thursday morning. Either they let the learner drivers out on their own or the person teaching you to drive drives like a twat.

So, for the benefit of Mr Clayton the driving instructor:
Red means ‘stop’ (that’s when the car isn’t moving any more).
Funnily enough, amber also means stop (that’s that kind of orangey colour on that metal stick next to the road Mr Clayton).

Another driving instructor (forgot to write down the name, damn) let their pupil turn without signalling while I stood there wondering when the law changed.

Now this one needs a bit more explanation….It’s where the road goes almost straight on from one section of Roundhay Road to the next one. It’s a left turn off the A58 and signalling, if I remember rightly is for when you’re turning or changing lanes or changing direction. And guess what – that junction is all three! Oh yes, there’s also the thing about letting other road users know what you’re doing. THE PEDESTRIANS WAITING AT THE CROSSING WHO AREN’T FUCKING PYCHIC NEED TO KNOW WHICH WAY YOU’RE FUCKING GOING YOU MORON!!!

More Triffic Traffic

On Roundhay Road there’s a sign at the pedestrian crossing saying ‘Beware of left turning motorists violating the traffic lights’ - There are some seriously bad drivers around here but they usually just ignore the lights – violating is going a bit far eh boys? Cars (of course) just ignore all the traffic signs and mini-cab drivers are obviously exempt from traffic laws even when not in the Harehills / Chapeltown area anyway, but I've never seen one of them actually shinning up the lights to shag them - they just do it metaphorically. Perhaps the sign should say 'beware of metaphors attempting to kill you'?

I also have to report a failure on the part of the Militant Pedestrians. Last time I took a boot-swing at a car I went and missed. No satisfying thunk, just a swinging leg and another maniac on his way to run another light with no consequence - Damn. It was the third one through the green man too. I told the man next to me that I physically attacked cars steaming through the pedestrian crossing and he looked at me like I might be going a bit far. Sort of person who thought that concentration camps were fine but gas chambers were a bit much I suspect. Steaming through red lights and across pedestrian crossings is a completely justifiable attack reason in my book and I'm going to continue to do it.

More on the gate

The fantastic Jurassic Park gate at the WSM rehearsal room?

Well, when it’s a bit blustery it doesn't work - because the phone line to the operations centre breaks up and you can't get through. So, you stand at the gate in bad weather and you can't get the gate open because a man presses a button in some control room somewhere only when you've been able to get through to him by phone - and it doesn't work! - and the gate doesn't work either! People park their cars outside and just climb over it under the security camera.
Oh, and there's a blank space where the phone number of the company should be written so you can phone form your mobile or somewhere - only its blank.

I should point out that it's the same sort of people who will be designing New Labour's nuclear power plants (for peaceful purposes only of course, completely different to the Iranians) and weapons of mass destruction. Again this is a completely different situation to that in Iraq - they didn't have any weapons of mass destruction.

Let me know if we're getting invaded or doing the invading. I guess it depends who's sponsoring terrorism - that's New Yorkers giving money to the IRA isn't it? Was '9/11' (the 9th November) done by the coalition of the willing?

Fag man

Today I saw a man throw his empty fag packet down in the street about 3 feet from a litter bin....I hope I never have to ask to use his bathroom.

No way, bonobo!

ITV really do have a new programme (or ‘show’) where viewers phone in to help save their favourite endangered species.

I say screw the pandas, vote for the polar bears. Or was it screw the blue whale, vote rattlesnake? Insect you've never heard of anyone? - nah, it's being turned into CO2 mate.

Maybe the NHS could move to this system - vote people out of hospital and such.

What will I have left to say when the whole world moves beyond parody? - Coming very soon it would appear.

Too Much Technology

There used to be a big gate at the WSM rehearsal complex (we hire an industrial estate so we have different buildings for our distribution, design, manufacture and marketing arms - though we actually disagree with marketing arms. They seem to sell themselves apparently, it’s a way governments have of killing children from other people's countries)....

Anyway, it was a bit difficult to open sometimes and a bit of a pain if you left late and the padlock was on. However, if you had the key it was actually possible to open the gate. It kind of works - use key, open gate, get in, use key, close gate...you know the way a normal person would work this kind of system rather than a brainless moron.

But now Brainless Moron Security have taken over and we rehearse in Jurassic Park. This comes complete with a huge great gate on rollers - covered in sensors and flashing lights and control boxes, presumably designed to keep the velociraptors in. Unfortunately, there are only the people who pay rent to use the place to keep in.

So now, instead of just opening the gate you have to press a button on a box and ask to go to the toilet (sorry, ask to be let out). The button calls some bloke up in an office belonging to the security company somewhere. You have to ask him to open the gate and let you out. So what if he’s not there? Because someone isn’t around in Dewsbury or wherever they are I can’t get the gate open. And…with it being covered in sensors and lights and boxes as a normal person might guess - IT DOESN’T FUCKING WORK. The man ignores the phone, then he says he has to check something, then he pushes a button to open the gate (though he doesn’t tell me he’s done this of course, he’s a man of few words) and the GATE DOESN’T FUCKING OPEN. He then says he thinks there's a problem and he might have to send someone over. I'm standing next to the gate I used to be able to open with a key and now it won't fucking open and you think you might have to send someone over???? Excuse me, but are we waiting for the satellite to go over or something?

Pardon me for stating what you would think was obvious but why not let me, the bloke standing at the gate actually open the sodding thing? What if there's a fire or a powercut or no-one in the office or any other technical glitch or human error? Does this make me a Luddite or just NOT A FUCKING MORON!!! How could anyone have thought this system was a good idea? Whatever happened to a) the bullshit detector or b) the reality check. What do I do when I want in on a bank holiday or something?

….and I want a starting handle for the car and I don’t want it controlled by microchips. I want it to be repairable by a man who drives a tractor in Rumania. I want to take stuff to be repaired rather than having to buy a new one and I don’t want to leaf through a New Labour PFI brochure to ‘choose’ the best hospital to stop the bleeding after I’ve started climbing the gate to the T-Rex pen to find it moving underneath me.

I find it so tiring to fight useless twattery that I think it would be easier to buy Semtex and just blow the fucking gate to pieces. People would call it an over reaction but I'm not going to take it anymore - so plastic explosive it is.

Supermarkets #3

Kwiksave (Roundhay Road, Leeds) remain the only supermarket where in one visit I’ve been completely ignored by three staff having a conversation across the tills. If they're quiet you also have to go to the 'wineshop' to pay. No clues of course, you have to ask the magazine reader at the till for directions, which they give you with a look that makes it clear they think you're a moron. At the wineshop they're borderline racist and throw the bag at you and push your stuff out of the way, giving you no chance to put it in the bag. Mind you, in Beeston I heard the checkout woman call herself a ‘silly cunt’ for dropping some coins on the floor. Kwiksaves always had empty shelves when I went in them years ago - and they still do!

Still, they keep their milk nice and warm at least.

Supermarkets #2

When I go to pay at the supermarket checkout (hey, I'm talking to YOU Somerfield), do not make the cashier shout ‘do you like muffins?’ at me out of the blue. If you do I’m likely to say ‘yes, I’m a typewriter’ or maybe – ‘shut your mouth!’ – ‘and anyway, these are buns, I’m ENGLISH you twonk’. I might even comment that had I wanted the buns that were on offer in the big display near the door I’d have bought some and brought them to the till. Why not stand something on the counter that you have hidden away that I might not have seen. Don't try to sell me stuff or I'm not coming back.

Supermarkets #1

In Gipton LIDL they have a system of scanning items at the checkout and throwing them at you – almost literally. There’s a section of counter a foot square and they push everything off the edge – you’re expected to have your trolley there ready to catch stuff. They might as well say ‘get the fuck out of our shop, you twat’. They tell you off if you have your trolley in the wrong place. They’ve done it for years and the management do the same thing. No please or thank yous either. You’d think that at least some pretence of not treating customers like dogs with diarrhoea would even have reached Gipton by now – no chance.

Questions, Questions...

A straw focus group poll sample of whoever it was I asked were asked to rank the following in order of rudeness / hot sex action:

1. How’s your father
2. Slap and tickle
3. Rumpy pumpy

The answer to this is of course quite clear. Slap and tickle is of course less serious than how’s your father (which is quite broad I feel but probably means sexual intercourse). In turn rumpy pumpy surely must mean sexual intercourse.

I’m also interested to know the answer to the following questions:

Why a ‘piece of crackling’ but a ‘bit’ of fluff?
How fancy is a fancy man?
When did the nymphomaniac disappear (my guess is with having ones tonsils out and lumbago - but feel free to correct me if I’m wrong).

What is the percentage decline in the wolf whistle since 1950?

Why did ‘shooting brake’ lose out over ‘estate car’?

There are a million questions where that one came from. I'm afraid I shall die without ever finding the answers to any of them.

Working, Being King of the World and New Labour

It struck me today that between the beginning of 2000 and the middle of 2006 I worked full-time! What was I thinking? Full-time? Well, that’s just not right now is it? When I’m King of the World working full-time will be banned and anyone wishing to do so will be locked away indefinitely as having a gross personality disorder.

Luckily, the mechanism for doing this is being put in place today by New Labour (along with all the other ones I’ll need to maintain my iron grip – hey hey!). Locking people up in case they might do something bad is a good one isn’t it? How about locking up some politicians in case they do bad things eh? – perish the thought! No-one seems to realise that political prisoners were never locked up in the Soviet Union as ‘political prisoners’, they were usually locked up for their own protection and the protection of society. Clearly not wanting to belong to the Party demonstrated they were mentally ill and therefore dangerous. But, hey the Home Secretary is elected here so its all OK – mind you, so was Hitler – but at least one or two people noticed him making things oppressive. How long before they start carting off people suspected of ‘bad things’ to be tortured or put away – whoops, they do that already - only by CIA plane instead of cattle trucks. Still, it’s Britain, it’s New Labour and nobody cares. That makes it OK you know.

Never mind, it’s unlikely to be you…unfortunately for you however, when I’m king of the world it WILL be you! Don’t say you weren’t warned WORMS! HA HA HA – I will be Home Secretary so its an ASBO control and behaviour order and detention without trail – oh yes, and I’ll decide your ‘tariff’ depending on what the Sun says – send in the army!

Nurse, fetch the screens!

Greetings Pop Pickers / Goodnight Pop Pickers

Well there are only two words that can be used in answer to the question ‘Is the news that Alan ‘Fluff’ Freeman has died very sad?’

They are of course....Nod ‘arf!

This is my mailout!

If you're reading this and you didn't get it by e-mail you really should sign up for my e-mail 'annoy you via e-mail' e-mail. I contact you once in a while and try to get you to come to gigs and stuff. I also tell you secrets though... You might even find a free plastic glider with one one day. The below is the kind of thing that you get - what an ego idiot eh?

JP Gigs - at a weekend!

Dear All

It's been a while so it's update time if that's OK with you. If its not, let me know and I'll take your name off the list (and transfer it to my 'little black book of doom' which will ensure that bits of your body will turn black and fall off within the fortnight).

Apart from getting made redundant, finding another job with less hours (and a lot less money to give to beggars on the street) and spending my redundancy money on posh guitars (in the street), I've been recording the 'difficult second album' in a cellar in Armley (where the drugs arrive over the wall in dead birds, you know). It'll be ages before its out because 'when you think I've recorded all I can I'm gonna record you a little bit more' - plus I can't stop fiddling with it / I keep coming up with new songs.
But (and it's a medium sized but quite shapely but), I've decided to patronisingly turn out to play a couple of Leeds gigs just for you - you know, its not that far (for me, not you!), I can go on the bus and be home in time for cocoa and buns.

So, I'll be playing the stuff you all know so well (hey, you - send us £7 and I'll post a copy of the album to you - you can even pay by paypal via www.johnparkes.com ) plus some new stuff.

So, kick out the cows and put these 2 dates in your dairy - it's next weekend though. I don't normally do weekend gigs so who knows who'll be there.

Saturday 2nd December 2006 - Breeze Bar, Wellington Street, Leeds, (opposite Mio Modos)
I searched for this place the other day and couldn't find it. It's actually next to where the Post Office sorting office was before the Post Office got bored with doing post officey things and started doing whatever it is they do now. It's set back from Wellington Street under one of those 'urban living' (i.e. slums of the future) blocks of flats with one of those 'metropolitan' small supermarkets (i.e. like Spar with stupid prices) next door. It's all a bit IKEA in there by the looks of it.
Sunday 3rd December 2006 -Santiago's, Grand Arcade, Leeds, (top of Briggate)
As you can see from the above, I was told this was off the top of Briggate (often thought about throwing myself off the top of Briggate). It's actually at the bottom of the Grand Arcade making it much nearer Vicar Lane opposite the Templar but the Arcade (hey, let's call it an alley!) runs from opposite the Templar up to Al Capone's. So, all in all its a bit more street level - though I expect the drinks prices will still be a laugh anyway.
Both of these are sort of pub times I think. They're probablyfree in too though don't quote me...


So, there you go. For those of you not in Leeds I hope you enjoyed the directions, for those who are I hope I'll see you down there (where I can pretend I don't know you, obviously - actually, if I do that it may be because I haven't actually seen you, come up and buy the album).

Mind how you go

John

PS

Have also been doing Whole Sky Monitor stuff - there's now a myspace page for WSM - http://www.myspace.com/wholeskymonitor You can download free stuff onto your MPods or whatever - it's like a walkman with loads of tapes you know - but don't say that because you'll just embarrass yourself with the kids. They all want to sleep with me obviously but you, well, you'll just sound old y' know.

On-line quiz 2 – How rude is fruit

Which of these is the rudest piece of fruit / vegetable?

Carrot
Banana
Grapes
Cherries
Cucumber
Courgette
Fig (DH Lawrence only)
Plums
Coconuts
Melons
Peach / peaches
Oranges

Of course, for myself I’m partial to a nice pear…funny old world though eh?

On-line quiz 1 - Pink Panties

At the swimming pool today I saw a young man in the changing room pull on some very pink ladies ‘panties’*

What was the correct procedure and what did I actually do?

1. Stroll up saying ‘Hi, I notice you’re wearing girls underwear, it looks pretty comfortable, I was thinking of getting some for myself, I’d really value your opinion...’

2. Point while shouting ‘hey everyone, laydees underwear alert, 2 o’clock!’

3. Quietly have a word with reception hoping they’ll send security to have him and his panties removed.

4. Shout ‘Oy you, you weirdo, we don’t want your sort in here!’

5. Wink and nudge him in the ribs while whispering conspiratorially ‘took ‘em off her last night did you? Top job mate’

6. Try to ignore it and tell (a small part of the) world by quietly putting it on your blog
(Note: 6 is the right answer, did you guess? - really?!!)

* while I’m on, this is one of those words that can’t be used free of connotation…which of these do you use?

1. Panties – silly and a bit rude
2. Knickers – too rude
3. Bloomers – too comic
4. Smalls – too old fashioned and too comic
5. Pants – too confusing for Americans
6. Strides - too modern and I don't know where it comes from
7. Trolleys - See 6 above

I could've got the old Thesaurus out and got more panting words, but why would I? You'd begin to think I'm strange - and don’t even get me started on the need for a female equivalent of ‘willy’ children, for the use of.

While sat in Somerfield's Car Park

While sat in Somerfield's car park, I found myself asking the following questions (not necessarily related to supermarkets) -


What happened to knobbly knees competitions?

Should one say threppence or thruppence? (and what would my mother say if I lost sixpence on the way to the slipper baths?)

In the doctor’s waiting room, why have I never seen a small boy with a saucepan stuck on his head – or a small boy with a neatly sawn piece of railing round his neck? I feel cheated to be honest - most of the people in there don't even look ill.

Why are there posters up at my work talking about Dobbin the dealer? Are drugs being sold to young people by a horse? Shouldn’t he be relatively easy to spot? Still, if he’s a hoodie maybe not…even then, surely someone would spot the 4 legs. Isn't 'horse' a slang name for heroin? - Perhaps the hip and happnin' dudes as the Council or somewhere got confused - but then a dude ranch is something to do with horses is it not? Perhaps horses are the connection we've all been looking for?

Lummie, it's a rum un - and no mistake.

Voodoo Attack

The voodoo attack on my house continues.

Strange organic items thrown in the re-cycling wheelie bin and, even madder than that, what appeared to be a thick swatch of grey hair sticking out of the exhaust pipe of the car. It was coming from inside – had to wrench it out. Chucked it in the bin.

Supernatural-ness fully exorcised by rinsing out the wheelie bin with a bucket of water – easy! – And you can shout at poltergeists apparently.

And the Blair Witch Project was the most boring film ever - even the bits of gristle on washing lines. The curse of the ancients will decend, lucky heather anyone?

John's Facts of the Day

I’m currently using a bar of soap that was partially eaten by mice – several years ago.

I bought some ‘festive' mince pies that had a sell-by date of 19th November.

Until recently it never occurred to me that the name Sandie Shaw was a pun.

Poundstretcher (or whatever they call themselves now) sell Advent calendars - for dogs.

My printer directs everything straight into the bin.

This week I was given £785 in cash by the representative of a toilet cubicle manufacturer.

My local swimming baths has a viewing area - but no place for wanking.

JP Blog Stolen

Someone bought me that book ‘Is it Just me or is Everything Shit?’. It turned out to be very like my blog (in my opinion anyway) except that some of the targets were wrong. They’ve obviously stolen it – and made it into a successful book – bugger!

That Strange Bus Crash

A bus drove into Ainsley’s cake shop in town a few weeks back. I don’t know how it happened but presumably to stop it happening again a concrete lump (a five foot cube!) has been erected in front of the shop and sleeved in steel. That way the next out of control bus will hit an immovable object. Should wreck the front end of the bus….Less expensive and dangerous than wrecking a shop window? Someone must think ‘yes’! They gave away free bus tickets to people buying sandwiches too…Now what about an apology for the fares you bandits?

Shampoo

Well, I know. You know this too - The world of advertising is so tightly up it's own bottom that the sphincters who 'work' in it (I saw some captioned on telly as 'creatives' - ha ha!) are in danger of bursting like over-microwaved fat smug southern sausages. However, someone gets paid (presumably) to write descriptions on shampoo bottles and no-one stops them going completely mental, more mental than you would think it possible to go even for a really big family sized roasting tosser.

I thought I’d done this one years ago but I’ve been at the shampoo (or ‘fake shit’ as I call it) bottles again....

I bought a bottle of ‘cleansing’ shampoo from Tescos recently. Presumably they do a ‘dirtying’ version then? Mind you, they do ‘Chinese meal solutions’. I checked the dictionary definition. As I thought, dissolved in water. They must be for people who can only eat by sucking through a straw. I’ve definitely said this before you know…’Parkes’s Perfectly Reasonable Rant Solutions’ it says on the side of my van.

Talking of shampoo though, there are 2 shampoo bottles in the bathroom that aren’t mine. One is Garnier Fructis ‘FRESH fortifying cream conditioner’ ‘with active fruit concentrate’ ‘for normal hair that gets greasy quickly’ ‘with innovation no heaviness formula’ ‘for hair that shines with all its strength’. Mm. I’m surprised the bottle is strong enough to support the weight of such a truckload of dog turd. It really does say all that (and more) on the one bottle. Presumably people read it. Presumably this is meant to make their product sound good in moron land?

Do I really need to say anything or are you pulling on the combat trousers and ringing your dodgiest mate with the temper as we speak?

Sorry, but these are some of the questions I’ll be asking them when they’re all trussed up and begging to be allowed to visit the toilet…

Well, what if I think the fruit concentrate is not ‘active’ enough – how ‘active’ do they promise it is? – does it jog? and what fruit is it then and why would I want said fruit concentrated?
What if I find it stale and not fresh at all?
What if I find the formula still leads to slight heaviness? – and can I question the level of innovation?
What if I find my hair only shines with part of its strength?

The other shampoo ‘Locks in coloured hair vibrancy’. Do I want vibrancy locking into my hair? NO, I WANT THESE ADVERTISING TWATS BEGGING ON THE STREETS AND BEING PISSED ON BY VAGRANTS.

Extract from my Travelogue of Leeds

Those finding themselves with a half day to spare may wish to consider tracking down a branch of the ‘Post Office’. Once a common sight on the high streets of England, a few doughty individual branches continue to cling on to a precarious existence in some parts of the city. Despite extremely long queues of customers apparently wanting to part with money for the various services offered, they continue to close, the wear and tear on the floor simply too extreme to be funded by the meagre profits available.

However, the experience represents a metaphor for life and if struggle, frustration, boiling anger and resentment bordering on violence are what you’re looking for on an outing then this could be the place for you.

Please note the queue to reach the counter can reach several hours – sandwiches, flask and toilet tent will be essential.

Have to get direct now...there are only 2 post offices in Leeds city centre now and there's a queue of 35 people waiting to get in each of them in the morning. They closed down the main one (presumably because it was too busy for them). The queues stay at about 35 all day so far as I can see. When I'm paying someone money, what right do they have to keep me waiting for 40 minutes? Try getting to the counter and waiting for 40 minutes. What happens if some poor sod keep the directors waiting 40 minutes....now there's a point.

I get so drained by this combination of shite service and leaflets and websites wanking on about 'our commitment to our customers' that I can't even be bothered to complain anymore.

By the way, when my Dad were a lad he worked with someone who let his wife know if he'd be home for dinner by sending her a postcard.

'All Day Breakfast Ciabatta'

I recently bought (at somebody else’s expense!) an ‘All Day Breakfast Ciabatta’

I expected it to have, well, you know, breakfast type stuff in it. Just to give you the full flavour (ha ha!), this is what it says on the packet –

‘Lincolnshire sausage and hard boiled egg with cheese, sweetcure bacon & sunblush tomato relish in a plain ciabatta'.

OK, let’s break this down…that’s potentially 6 yummy breakfast ingredients…but only potentially…

1. ‘Lincolnshire sausage’ – Hey! Yes! 1 out of 1. I will definitely give you that one. A breakfast ingredient and no mistake.

2. Hard boiled egg’ – So not fried or scrambled or even poached then? However, sure as eggs is eggs I’ll let you have ½ for that one, almost a breakfast ingredient – that’s 1 ½ out of 2.

3. Cheese – Now, you’ve gone way off there I’m afraid – anyone here have cheese for breakfast? Thought not. That’s 1 ½ out of 3 then.

4. ‘Sweetcure bacon’ – Hey, you’re back with us my laughably expensive catering friend. 2 ½ out of 4. I’ve even let you off ‘sweetcure’ (which you didn’t do anything to deserve).

5. ‘Sunblush tomato relish’. Mm, you’re taking the piss again now aren’t you? You lose a point for the fact that ‘sunblush’ is a registered trademark. Rather like registering ‘I am a wanker’ don’t you think? - And certainly no points for putting ‘relish’ in the breakfast thank you. That’s 1 ½ out of 5.

6. ‘Plain ciabatta’ – OK, it’s bread, you can have a point for that – that’s 2 ½ out of 6.

Now then, all you had to do was to PUT BREAKFAST STUFF IN THE BREAKFAST BREAD THING and you could have had 6 out of 6 six no matter what it tasted like. I wouldn’t have thought you were a total waste of tosser. It's a sanDwich - BUT IT'S NOT BREAKFAST YOU SUNBLUSH CHEESE SWEETCURE IDIOTS!!

Another Painful Consumer Decision

Mmm, Tescos had 2 kinds of Quorn sausages in the freezer. Both £1.59 (and about £1 over priced I’d say). One sort are ‘surprisingly succulent’. The others are ‘surprisingly tasty’.

So in what way do I want to be surprised when I get them home? This kind of implies that you’re expecting them not to be tasty or succulent in the first place. It also somewhat ruins the surprise if they do turn out to be either 1 - succulent or 2 - tasty. ‘Heaven’s to Betsy’ I’ll exclaim to Morag the cat, ‘these sausages were advertised as surprisingly tasty, now I can taste them and its not really a surprise, what a disappointment, I shall have to take this up with old Mr Tesco or the Quorn brothers when I see them next…unless I bought the ones which were surprisingly succulent; in which case substitute the word succulent for tasty in my last utterance - and would you like some milk?’

One of these kinds of sausages are called ‘bangers’ which is just too matey and old fashioned for words. The other sort are ‘Cumberland’. I’m not sure that Cumberland even exists anymore though for some reason I’m not wound up about the fact. Are these sausages made of hippo or is that the Cumberland herby bed shops?

What I Did On My Holidays

Recently went on Holiday to Llandudno. Here's the brief diary...

Saturday

Saw a hedge dolphin
Sea trip on a boat called the ‘Gorgeous Gusset’

I knew it was going to be a good week on discovering that the previous residents (self catering)had left tins. Tins of: tomatoes; potatoes; Bigga Processed Marrowfat peas; washing up liquid. The real prize however was a large tin of Pek Chopped Ham with Pork. Checked for injection marks. No trace. It doesn’t get any better than this. Am definitely on holiday.

Sunday

And on to a ‘Family Funday’ in Llandudno. Mainly unmarked marquees with people sitting at trestle tables. No hint as to what any of them were doing. Signing people up for the gymkhana was a possibility. Didn't ask, just whistled and moved away. Chain smoking man on bouncy castle. Paid for 5 minutes, discretion better thing of velour at 9 minutes. Ironically the length of time taken off his life for each cigarette - Karma or something.

Monday

Feeling rather let down recently by the level of entertainment value of the nutter on the bus. Either that or I’m learning that there are no ‘nutters’ but only those with ‘mental health issues’ or ‘learning difficulties’ (and the King of Africa obviously - will tell you about him sometime).

On the bus a man was making a series of statements:

‘How much have you got left to spend?’
‘You can take a picture of me if you like’
I’ve got to get to Rhyll to send my best friend a postcard’
‘They say it’s £6 to get in York Minster. I wouldn’t pay £6 to buy York Minster’
He also explained that he worked as a military advisor to Colin Powell - ‘ It doesn’t pay much, but its something’


I say hats off to the traditional British nutter – long may he sit next to someone else on the bus (but in earshot of me, obviously)

Tuesday

Professor Codman’s Wooden Headed Follies. I demanded sausages as one clearly would. I got them (and a crocodile) but they weren't fully integrated into the story so a bit disappointed. Why doesn't someone apply for a grant to send Mr Punch to an anger management workshop for those defining themselves a violent pychopath? I live too close to Gipton to be scared.

Later on a shopkeeper was offering advice to an elderly nun - purse securing, that kind of thing. Like nuns don't have training in this sort of thing. Everyone knows that muggers go for nuns. Good on you Ms shopkeeper!

Wednesday

As freedom is taken away by right wing authoritarian governments and corporate rules, I’ve noticed a small niche of comparative freedom being seized by ordinary people. This is in charging for 5 year olds. Never say ‘2 adults and one child please’ because the rules will say everyone gets charged. Say ‘2 adults and a small person please’ The person selling the ticket or whatever will smile and probably not bother charging – hurray. Luckily, there’ll be fingerprinting babies soon and checking them against the database so you won’t be able to get out of it.

Have I mentioned that Birmingham station has a 'revenue protection barrier'. Built by the Israelis to keep rockets out I'll be bound. They check tickets - a bit like at a ticket barrier, though with a ludicrous name obviously.

Thursday

Spent most of the day avoiding Christians. The tenacity of the needy and deluded eh? The ‘Beach Team’ promise 'games, quizzes, songs, prizes and bible stories' - and an unhealthy dose of irrational medieval belief system I'll bet...Saw them raring to go in red sweatshirts. Was also invited to a ‘Free 20 minute audio visual presentation’ of 'amazing stories from the past' including 'Mary Jones and a long trip to Bala for a Bible' by the 'United Beach Missions'. Sorely tempted obviously. If I became a Christian I’d probably start a mission to lap-dancing clubs where I’d be sorely needed (or sorely kneeded if I found the right club and paid extra).

Friday

Given a lift back from a farm by a laughing Czech with a car floor full of bottles swilling round the floor. Close encounter with a gnu.

Have spent the week doing what the Brits do best – reaching for a cardie. This reminds me that in Leeds 6 you can find the Cardigan Centre. Just next door to the Scotch Wool shop I assume.

Went to get my hair cut before coming home. 2 women on. Must be age or something. I make for the older one (as she probably knows how to cut hair) rather than the young pretty one (who is young and pretty). Mind you, the young pretty one turned out to be from Hull so decision well made I guess.

Saturday

Usually my puns are pretty lame ‘you’re all Toksvig’ (meaning ‘you’re all sandy’ as in 'you've got sand on you' rather than thinking everyone has somehow turned into Sandie Shaw) would be a typical example. However, you could buy a ‘Damsel Costume’ in Conway / ‘Conwy’ castle. This allowed me to pick it up and say to a young female companion: ‘you look like a damsel in dis dress’. Classic.

Here's a Good One! - Parcelforce

I ordered some tapes from Florida recently to keep the old Tascam 688 portastudio going.

Parcelforce are taking care of delivery 'this end' which is why they decided to return them to sender rather than actually delivering them to me or telling me they had them. Or telling me anything in fact. In order to check what's going on you need a 17 figure 'Parcel Reference Number'. This appears on the letter they send you which tells you you have to pay import duty etc. If they don't send you this letter you don't have the number. This means that when you call the depot you can't use the phone system because it asks for the number - that you haven't got.

Next stage is a 'Clearance fee' of £8. Did I mention that I've already paid the postage?

So, so far I've waited since May for the package. They wouldn't give it to me, they wouldn't tell me they'd got it, they wouldn't let me speak to them and now they want £8 to release it.

Following a website search and calls to their call centre I now have a letter (which is how I know about the £8). If I call them today (a Thursday) they can deliver it the next day. I won't be in on Friday. Luckily you can get them to deliver on Saturday.

The charge for this is an extra £12.

I'm not making this up. Anyone want to set fire to the depot? My arson fee is £25.56 + VAT.

Militant Pedestrians in Public Incident - Again!

Your local representative of the Militant Pedestrians (which is me of course) nearly had a fight in the street today. The usual half dozen cars went through the amber / red light at the junction of Harehills Lane andRoundhay Road without apparently noticing that there were cars backing up on the other side and that there was no way through - or probably did but just thought they'd go anyway. I walked out onto the pedestrian crossing after the green man came on - in front of a stationery car. The driver got very cross as one does when one's wanker driving is challenged. I told him not to drive across pedestrian crossings when the green man is on. He didn't like this; he got out of his car - lots of fingers and some nose to nose stuff ensued. I should of course have stayed detached and cool and just taken the piss. Instead I was just MAAAD! Didn't do my stress levels any good but, hey, point made again I think.

Once again I need to know - how many cars is it that are allowed through a light once its changed to red? My guess is that it must technically be 3 or 4.

On a related subject, don't driving instructors teach anyone what a yellow hatched area in the road means? Has this gone the way of hand signals and not using the horn as a rebuke? Militant pedestrians say ban the car! When there were pickets of the oil terminals a few years back the quality of life shot up for a couple of days.

- And long live the Mobile Slasher! Just in case you didn't see this - A vigilante, who slashes the tyres of motorists who talk on their mobile telephones while driving, is being hunted by police. The so-called "mobile slasher" leaves an anonymous note made from letterscut from newspapers on the windscreens of the cars. The note reads: "Warning. You have been seen driving while using your mobile phone."YES! YES! YES! Vote Slasher!

When I'm king of the world and Slasher is my right-hand man, flamethrowers will be installed at all pedestrian crossings (which will be on all roads and timed to actually stop the traffic rather than changing just after the traffic has gone and you've crossed the road). When Psychoboy from today (hey, he leapt out of his car! - I could have stolen it!) or any drivers doing the same drive through they'll simply be instantly cremated in the street. The flames will be of such temperature and ferocity that he won't even block the road because he'll be a small pile of ash. His relatives will be sent a large bill for his cremation.

Tesco Bag

In the Tescos Express in Armley (the district, not the jail - or gaol) you get a free Clubcard point if you use your own bag. In the one on Easterly Road the machine won't let you use your own bag. It detects the weight of your Tescos 'bag for life' and asks you to remove it from 'the bagging area' (in the more interesting branches they have a 'de-bagging area' where you get to pour things on the floor or remove the trousers from a local). I harrumphed up to the counter and waited to be served by a person, I also wanted to pay with change, another thing you're not allowed to do by the machines that run the branch. I suppose I'll be unloading the lorries and stocking the shelves for free next, as well as serving myself. The fruit is priced in single items too. Best to stick with the Co-op. Don't forget to ask for your divvy! There's usually one around.

Incidentally, have you noticed how we're losing the word 'shop' in favour (or favor, probably) of the word 'store'. I'm old enough to remember these things you know...which means its time for bed.

Too old to spell Jung

OK, I spelt Jung as Yung - kept me searchin' for a heart of gold, but I'm gettin' old - etc.

While I'm on, I spent the bank holiday in Armley - not the jail, the district of Leeds. If you heard pained shouting it was me fuelling up on Neil the producers ground coffee - and shouting for at least as much as I was worth. New songs, shouty ones...

Neil is old enough to remember when octane was important to motorists - or lawn mower owners (if you had a petrol one of course)....get it wrong and you'd be running in the shooting brake and it'd start pinking on the hills. I got to here from the coffee you see...Cars also had a starting handle and garages had a mechanic as well as actually serving you with petrol. I last saw this a few years back in Holbeck - wondered what the woman was doing grabbing hold, sticking it in and pumping away - then I had to pay her...

Laura Mercier Flawless Skin

It seems grooming products and water are my themes of the moment.

Anyway, this is real…..I saw a display in town for this stuff. I really am not making this up. Laura Mercier Flawless Skin is real, honestly....It says (and I quote)

‘Remarkable skincare based on the anti-ageing properties of Deep Sea Water extracted off the coast of Japan’

Yes that’s right – salty water! I like the word ‘extracted’ too – it all sounds better than dipping a bucket in the sea at Cleethorpes but it’s the same thing. I’m going to market Tracy Pleb's ‘Imperfect Skin’ – based on the salty water properties of a fat bloke with a bucket in Clacton. Could knock it out for a fraction of the price. Same thing but loads cheaper.

While I'm on, have you noticed that loads of shampooey types things have 'aqua' as the first ingredient. They often have 'liquidium parafinium' in too! That'd be water and liquid parafin in cod Latin then would it - faecesium shittinitium then. Soylent Green for these people I think. Oh yes.

I watched the telly - and it was like this...

While on holiday I watched some telly. It went like this….

The programme is an hour long. Firstly, instead of the programme you get ‘coming up next’ which is an advert for the programme that’s supposed to be on already. Next up, adverts. Then the actual programme starts, sort of…It starts with about 10 minutes about what was in the programme last week followed by another 10 on what’s coming up in this week’s programme - then it goes to adverts again. Then it tells you again what is coming up in this week’s programme before giving you a couple of minutes of what it’s actually about. Then it goes to adverts. After every advert break there’s a summary of what’s was in the programme before the adverts and what’s coming up next. The same after each ad break. Towards the end there’s a summary of what’s going to be on next week.

Content free television really is here. Why not make a 5 minute ‘I’m not a moron’ version of the programme? I guess the answer is that if you’re watching you must be a moron. No more experiments in watching TV for me I’m afraid.

Chat Magazine!!!

If you’ve never read Chat magazine you probably know someone who does - really. I mean, WOW! - ‘An alien baby at 18 but now I want a real one’. ‘I turned into a sad, smelly slob – to satisfy my fella’. Bring it on!

The copy I saw included handy hints - one was to make a cardboard ‘loose cover’ for a standard size tissue box - covered with leftover wallpaper. I mean, try to stop me!

One of the problem page letters concerns a woman who suspects her husband is masturbating. A married man masturbating? How could such a thing happen? The woman is clearly delusional.

There was also a story about a woman from Leeds - ‘I was quacking up as an ugly duckling - but now I can swan about’ - fantastic!

At one point this woman says (or a ‘journalist’ paraphrases) ‘When I was 12 my boobs started growing – and growing….Terri two-bras the girls started chanting’. Then she says ‘I started skipping lessons when I was about 14’.

Well, excuse me but if you’re being teased about having a large bosom, I’d suggest that skipping is probably not the ideal sport for you….Some people!

Chat magazine though eh? Like the Sun, you should read it at least once before you die. More than three times and you’ve got a problem.

Incidentally, The 'Thomas Kinkade Faith Mountain - illuminated Masterpiece Edition' advert (only £149.94) was beyond parody.

Yorkshire Water again

Yorkshire Water put up a sign in the street near me next to a big hole in the road, it said ‘find out what we’re doing here by phoning 0845 1202020’. Well, don’t bother. I phoned and what a waste of time it was. Not only do they not appear to know or care what we’re doing here but they have little or no insight into the meaning of life at all. Evolution? God? Alien Life? Jung? Existentialism? Not interesting in discussing any of them, not even interested in the hole in the road as metaphor. The question that beats me is what were they doing offering philosophical insights on a metal sign in the road in the first place? I’ll ask before I pay the next bill.

The time I met Sir George Martin

I recently bought the Alan Partridge radio series CD set off ebay. He does a great non story about George Best. So....in honour of that, here's the story of the time I met Sir George Martin:

It was about 1991 and I was with the Wedding Present staying at the Columbia hotel, England's closest equivalent to the Chelsea hotel (though I never got a blowjob off Janis Joplin or even anything near equivalent to be honest). I went to check the van hadn't been towed away and to put some money in the meter. Who should be there at the meter than (Sir) George Martin. He said 'I don't think this one's working'. Quick as a flash I replied 'No, I don't think this one is working either!'

The time I met Sir George there, great days....

I remembered this story after mentioning putting top rock stars straight in dreams. I don't do this often....I also have to remind myself that a blog reads kind of backwards so it doesn't really work properly.

Godda Gedda Widnes - Part 2

I bought a guitar from a couple at a hair dressers who gave me a beer, showed me their home studio and shared an enthusiasm for the Beatles. Nice people, nice guitar. Left some good feedback on ebay (not enough characters to get into characters or to mention beer).

On the way back I had a nice long time at Widnes railway station (by the way, why does everyone use the phrase 'train station' these days when 'railway station' is much nicer) . There's a plaque there that says that Paul Simon wrote 'Homeward Bound' there in 1965. Well, on the surface all very interesting and rock and roll and all that. However, I have to ask what kind of twonk actually gets out his guitar and starts playing in front of people on the railway platform? I had a guitar with me but if I'd have got it out and started calling myself a 'poet and a one-man band' I'd have been laughed at (by a teenager who hasn't been bummed among others). I reckon that's where he had the IDEA which he wrote about later. Next time I bump into Paul I'll ask him. I've told Paul McCartney a thing or two in dreams but never Paul Simon.

Godda Gedda Widnes - Part 1

I had a day out to Widnes last Tuesday. I spent the morning quietly mumbling ‘godda gedda Widnes’ to myself. Spent the afternoon and evening on trains mainly. Is there a war on? - this is the legitimate question posed by my sister who also doesn’t understand why trains can’t be designed to withstand the rigours of the British weather. Widnes was effectively cut off from the outside as far as trains were concerned, too much sun on the line or something. Warrington was a popular stopping place where trains were cleared of passengers and Scousers were peeved – though not as much as you might’ve thought.

Highlights of the day included:

After dinner mints on the platform
A man drooling over himself – who wasn’t sitting next to me!
A packet of golf tees (and a bottle of White Lightning) in the toilet
A teenager announcing to friends that she had ‘never been bummed’
A man attempting to remove his legs with a train
Jack the baboon and his signalman owner (with false legs)

I can get angry - but I am proud of myself

Hey!

I just discovered a letter I sent to Yorkshire Water. I think I may have mentioned them before. I was responding to an advert they use to scare old people. I'm quite proud of this...here's what I said.


Dear Sir or Madam

Thank you for your undated and un-addressed letter REF YWDP41K

Thanks for implying that we’re in terrible danger of being flooded and that we can buy ‘protection’ from you. No doubt lots of elderly and other vulnerable people will be giving you their money after you’ve scared them into thinking they’re going to suffer an emergency and that they’ll never get a plumber.

I object to your advertising, and come to that also to the fact that it’s delivered by the post office as if it was real post. I’d normally bin it but I think this despicable shite deserves a reply.

The solution to the plumber shortage is to train more plumbers and not for you to buy them up and extort money out of people for services they’re probably not going to need.

We won’t be taking up your ‘protection’. If you weren’t a monopoly supplier we’d go somewhere else for the water.

We got a plumber within about half an hour recently by the way and it wasn’t that expensive.

So, rip us all off, don’t bother giving us a name, deliver more stuff to us and we’ll bin it – and I guess we’ll have to keep paying whatever bills you send us – hurray for advertising, insurance scams and corporate capitalism!

Yours with the arsey attitude you deserve.



(John Parkes)

The WSM chapter of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (the Osiris Temple)

Please not that ‘the WSM chapter of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (the Osiris Temple)’ is not a branch of top band Whole Sky Monitor. WSM here stands for Weston Super Mare. Seaside towns r'us. FT readers may know what I mean.

Ram On!

Now I’m not that bothered about having a cool record collection. I’m more concerned about defending parts of my record collection from scorn and ridicule. I won’t get very far if I give you a list of records to defend all in one go – you will probably scoff. However, there comes a time is every person’s life when one has to simply assert.

So, my assertion is that Ram by ‘Paul & Linda McCartney’ is a great album. So there. It’s got some slightly embarrassing bits and some slightly twee bits – and its still great. Effectively Paul McCartney’s second solo album (and not credited to Wings – the band the Beatles could have been according to Alan Partridge of course…), it doesn’t set out to change the world but it’s a whole log less self important than John Lennon’s stuff around the same time.

It’s haunting in places, evocative of something I can’t put my finger on and sounds kind of sad and upbeat and playful…it sounds like the sun is out in the late afternoon and has family photos on it. I bought it on CD for £6 though I’ve lived with it since I was about 14 when I went through all the Beatles albums followed by most of their solo albums. I just love it. All music should speak to 14 year olds if possible (none of my own music does as far as I know).

I’ve known loads about the Beatles for years and it only occurred to me a few weeks ago that it’s probably called Ram (featuring the song Ram On) because Paul Ramon was the name he used in the early Beatles as a stage name. Let’s admit that John Lennon made a total arse of himself at times (though I’ll tell you about the John Lennon Plastic Ono band album at some point). Incidentally, for someone who likes puns, I only realised that the name Sandie Shaw was a pun a couple of years back - how stupid is that? Mind you, I live with someone who thought that Gilbert O'Sullivan might be the man's real name - let's not do Gilbert tonight...

Back to being 14. My bible was a book called ‘The Beatles – An Illustrated Record’ by Roy Carr and Tony Tyler. It was LP size and featured full size colour pictures of all the Beatles LP covers (so, so much better than CDs which as far as artwork goes are really a bit rubbish), biographical stuff and comments / reviews of all the singles and LPs including the solo stuff up until1974. Just think, on one day in 1965 you could go into a shop and buy 16(!) brand new Beatles songs – Rubber Soul for 14 and the Day Tripper / We Can Work It Out single. Two minutes silence needed or something.

Keeping up with the Soap and Butter

The other day I accidentally used some ‘Palmolive Ultra Nourishing Liquid Handwash with Shea Butter.’ Mistook it for soap. What a bunch of tossers eh?

Shea butter is of course very difficult to get hold of, being seasonal seat guano drippings from the famous Shea Stadium - harvested by Mexicans. My hands became so well ‘nourished’ they grew several inches and now have big square teeth, an obesity problem and very little knowledge of foreign affairs.

It's getting increasingly difficult to buy soap that's actually called 'soap'. I even washed my face with 'handwash' the other day and I'm getting a bit smelly because no-one seems to make 'willy wash' or 'arse wash' with Shea butter or otherwise. Similarly, it's now impossible to buy margarine - 'Speciality spreads' made with goat kidneys yes, margarine, no. I hate Tescos. Since they have 'Indian meal solutions' I assume they dissolve curry in water and you suck it through a straw. If not they can't speak English and should be sent back where they came from. B*stard marketing Tw*ts all I'm afraid.

Love your junk mail

These are my favourite titles from junk mail from the last couple of days:

1. Chipmunk passport 2. Evergreen convulse 3. Your cash paint drier 4. Flowerpot mumps
5. Your cash muse descended

My favourite ‘senders' were:

Riboflavin G Soddy (long time, no see Ribe!) and Damon Coit (Hi Damon!) - and you thought Disraeli Gears was cool!

Ironing

This one really hurts....

Dear reader, when I was eighteen years old I ironed something. The Sweeney was probably still on telly (and not a repeat - lets talk about that later....) A shirt, a t-shirt, a pair of gold lame underpants, whatever, I ironed something. It was possibly the worst 10 minutes of my life. I resolved never to iron again. I haven’t. Haven’t wanted to, haven’t needed to, haven’t been asked to, haven’t asked anyone to, just simply haven’t done it because it’s like being dead.

Occasionally someone will assume this is because someone irons for me. This is not true. If I catch anyone ironing for me I will tell them to stop immediately. It’s a filthy waste of time and you shouldn’t do it. Think of the sort of person who irons a shirt – not pretty is it? Think of the sort of person who wears an ironed shirt – disgusting isn’t it?

It’s simple – don’t iron, ever. It’s easier than giving up television because not all television is shit whereas all ironing is shit.

So imagine the humiliation, the sheer pain angst and screaming agony of being forced to iron a shirt – by your own band! Imagine when you’d done the desperate deed the drummer of the band shouting ‘who ironed that shirt? There are creases all up the front’. Well dear reader, the humiliee was me, Whole Sky Monitor were the humiliators. They dressed me up, criticised, made me wear other people’s clothes and generally pushed me about. They didn’t even do this for base sexual reasons apparently. They just have no sense, taste, decency, manners or nous. Set of ****s, I really hate them.

Joining the Circus

The Moscow State Circus was in town recently. Everyone's got a token except me and circus children (short hairy clowns with elastic legs to a child, you know) went to the local school - for two weeks. People thought they were Germans - though the days when the Home Guard would be called out with brooms have long gone you know. Tea's off ration and everything.

I had a wonder up there. It was during a performance, weird how quiet it was from the outside – a sound-proof big top? Anyway, I fondly imagined that the ticket office would be staffed by the Strong Man and the Bearded Lady between shows. I expected it to be closed during the show. It wasn’t. Nor was it staffed by the Bearded Lady or Strong Man understudies. In fact it was a girl from Gipton trained to do a Russian accent (possibly). Might have just been a Russian woman. Whatever.

Bought tickets, saw a man run over by a truck. Well worth £20, you could wait ages on the A58. It’s £32 in at Elland Road and you’re unlikely to see a man in leopard skin being run over by a truck. Unfortunately, he wasn’t actually dressed in leopard skin. He did have sparkly foil trunks though. I think that’s as good. Willy like garlic bread at the end of the show though I imagine - French rather than Italian. Men - don't think about that metaphor for too long.

Oh yes, and the woman doing the splits had the narrowest gusset you’re likely to see. Not that I’d be interested in a thin white gusset on a slim attractive blonde young lady suspended from the ceiling by wires and spinning, doing the splits.

No-one asked me to join. Felt a little affronted. I'm not answering their e-mails.

Somehting to beef about - ha ha!

MacDonalds say their burgers are 'made from 100% beef'.

So how come they taste sort of oniony too – and what holds them together? If they were 100% beef they'd just be beef wouldn't they?

What proportion of a 100% beef burger is beef? I suggest the answer is around 64% - such is the modern world.

Curvy Wooden Minxes

Just wanted to say that after certain ‘special’ people I know (you know, family, partner, ex-colleagues etc. - not necessarily people with special needs - though I love everyone, you know) one of the most beautiful things on earth is the Rickenbacker guitar. Specifically, the 360 12-string (and I quite fancy the 330 and some of the other 300 series too, the tempting little minxes). It just looks (and smells, incidentally) just FANTASTIC. I could just look at one for hours. ‘Fireglow’ is the best (the reddish one) though the maple ones look fab too – and black (‘Jetglow’) is great too. The blue ones and other odd colours are nice too. I just love them all. Some people buy them for investment and hang them on the walls - caged songbirds all, go and steal one to play if it’s hung on a wall or stored away. All the best guitars were designed ages ago which just goes to show. I had one once but had to sell it to pay studio bills before we’d got properly acquainted.

Having said all that, a Ric (as us guitar people call ‘em) for sale on ebay recently was referred to as ‘she’ throughout and it all seemed a bit, well, odd. This is not a sex thing, OK? I would never hit a woman with a plectrum to make her sing. Unless she asked. Nicely! Best to stop there I think.

Curvy Wooden Minxes - They make you want them. Then they're too expensive - Dang! (or drat, or perhaps Bother).

Off the Rails

Yowser!

Yup, I've had 2 1/2 months not blogging but now I'm on again. Thought I'd start off with a good story. Then I though nah, a couple of small rubbish ones.

First - I found a banana. In the street. At a bus stop. On the floor. What did I do? - I ate it, that's what. It was fully skinned (or not skinned at all depending on your definition I guess). I searched for needle marks, found none - just ate it. Willy Nilly! Crazy guy! The pageantry of roll eh?

Second - I'm attemping to spend £3,400 on guitars. I had a job, they got rid of me, they raided the pension fund, they gave me money - I've now broken a legal agreement to only tell 'close members of my family'. If it goes to court I'll explain that you're all close members of my extended family and it's all part of my religion. So there.

Better stories in future I'll bet. For now I got fired by e-mail, got another job, got addicted to ebay and stopped doing gigs because I'm lazy. Ate a banana from a bus stop.