tele-vision

Last night i watched two programes i normally miss. First up was "what not to wear" where people are ritually humiliated into following some made up cultural norm regarding clothes. The "guests" are poked and prodded into believing theyre freaks because of their sartorial choices and through the magical power of shopping they too can achieve the perfection of a perfume ad.

Actually that isnt fair, these people arent just randomly picked on and bullied, they have volunteered for this because they feel they need help with their clothing choices. Its the gleefull taunting of the presenters I cant stand, they revel in cajoling the poor saps about what people really think of them until the tears flow. Hateful television.

The other show was 'The Real Football Factories' where wideboy actor Danny Dyer goes to soccer clubs all around the world and interviews their hooligans. Every episode follows the same course. Danny arrives in Madrid/Naples/Bratislava meets a bunch of nutters who talk about pride and honour and passion and then cuts to CCTV footage of street fighting where there's no hint of any of those three things.

As a testostrone counter part to the early estrogen-fest it had weird similar themes. The power of going with the crowd, letting others make the descions for you. But the ladies are trying to change their lives, the blokes are just reveling in theirs.

Next week, I think I'll just read a book.

badders

Played in my first competitive match of the season and against all probabilities won both my matches.
There's 4 men a 4 women a side and its all doubles games so you have a mixed doubles then a mens or womens doubles. Each match is a best of three games and until last night id never won a game. Was a great feeling not letting the side down and taking maximum points away.

Back in action next week against the Steel Fury of our league. I'll be lucky to escape with minor brusing.

Stardust.

Stardust is the kind of film they tell you they dont make anymore. Straight out of the 'Princess Bride' mould its a fantasy romp with wit, humour, baddies you can boo at and genuine scares for the kids. Nice underplayed cameos by the cream of british comedy, mark heap, David walliams and Ricky Gervais. All in all the best movie ive seen since hot fuzz. And you can take the kids!

Neighbours, Weddings and why Anne Coulter is not a nice person.

The wedding mentioned last post was lovely, really informal, no speeches, few tear (of joy) lots of beer and a pig on a spit. Woot!

We have new neighbours next door, this happens quite regularly as it's a rental property that is just about up the code. If its the rental code from the 1690s. The heating just doesn't work the toilet backs up reguarly and theres an interesting fungus growing the bedroom wall that only answers to 'Kevin'.

As you can imagine the turnover is quite high and with Friday night being seriously cold the neighbours, who appear to be perfectly nice, had to go and stay somewhere else. However they left their dog in the house. So the pooch wakes up at 6:30 wonders where everyone is and where his breakfast is coming from. So he starts barking, and barking and barking and barking. Unfourtunatly this sets off the kennels in the house three doors down, so suddenly, lest i remind you at 6:30 IN THE MORNING, we have the canine equalivent of the St Martins in the Field choir blasting out all around us.

Em, bless her, can sleep through nearly anything. I however had to get up and I think it stuck me in a grump for the rest of the day. thats the only way I can explain pushing some of the weaker pedestrians into traffic as I stomped around the high street.






Anne Coulter, who I have mentioned before as a ferociously intelligent dangerous right wing bigot who's had her homepage hacked. The reason why this is funny is most right wing names are, to be fair, limited in their intellegence. Shaun Hannity, Bill o'Reilly these are not people who debate or explore topics. They are the finger pointers, the agitators, the empty vessels making the most noise.

Idiots in other words.

But Anne Coulter is not an idiot, she is incredibly intelligent and this she fascinates the other side. "With a brain like hers she should be with us!" Which is why an open letter explaining your entire career was a joke has a strangely plausible ring to it. Sadly it is a fake, she's still the same brittle, attractive, damaged woman she ever was. More's the pity. She des strike me as someone who's hollow inside.

In the interests of balance her real website is here but, honestly, if you're used to thinking for yourself and your political views sit anywhere to the left of, say, Goebbels I'd give it a miss.

Enjoyed the last game of the world cup. I did think the fairy tale for England would come true but a stronger south african side held out in a tense nervy game. And actually with all the hyperbole surounding the Springboks I can only imagine the reams of shit that would have been spewing from the commentators mouths if England had won it. Anyway, England have nothing to be ashamed of, they showed that experience can be more effective than youth. It does however help if you have youth in the shape of Tait and Flood to come on as fresh legs. Those boys really impressed.

The Welsh were simply abysmal. But could talk for weeks about that, and will do but not on this forum.

Oh and if you've never seen rathergood.com this is a good introduction. Its just flash animation and musical stupidity but a great way to pass the time. Main site here.

Peace out homeboys.

neighbours, pizza and other rambly things.

the sweet sweet smell of....

..A day off! Woo!

One of my old school friends is getting hitched today and I've had to take the day off. I mean I could have gone to work early as the ceremony starts at 4:00PM but I thought sod it, I'll have a long weekend to recover.

Caroline and Steve are great individually but together they do make the perfect couple. Anyone that spends any time around them can see exactly how their dynamic works and its really a beautiful thing. I couldn't be more chuffed for them knowing how much happiness my own marriage has brought me.

We went out for a chinese meal on wednesday as a little stag/hen do type thing for them and I was sitting around a table with the same people I sat around a table in the sixth form common room and it did not feel in the least bit weird. Its lovely when you can stay in touch with people that mean a lot to you. It hapens very rarely so when it does hold on to it for all you're worth!

Passed my Exam resit. I say pass. I think 81% counts as slightly more than a pass. In fact it proved what I knew all along. My tutor didn't doesn't and will never know her arse from her elbow. This was the exam I previously failed by a couple of percent and she missed clear marks that were on the paper and when I called her on it she blew me off with some pathetic excuse.



You can insult my knowledge of football, film, computers, rugby, anything you like and I'll take that info on board and try to improve. But don't tell me I know nothing about payroll when I live breath and eat it.

This has been a public service message brought to you by the number 5 and the letter §.

morning!

Life's been kinda frantic lately. The new job as I have mentioned is working out really well, there a nice level of busy-ness without the arse clenching "ahhhhhh! I've only got five minutes to get this report straight and out to client!"

The new job is in house not outsourced which means there's none of this 'them and us' attitude that was sadly prevalent throughout my previous career. It wasn't meant to be like that of course, but there only so much of "Payrolls fucked up again!" you can take from the client before you start saying "Hang on a minute! wasn't it actually your equipment that failed again?! Aren't you using an easy target i.e. the only outsourced thing in your company, to avoid talking about the massive internal issues that are wrecking our chances of delivering you a good payroll?!"

Shit. I hope no one from the previous job reads this blog!

Anyway, new place totally different, bit further to drive but its not so bad, the only really bad thing is I don't really get a chance to write anything at work. I can tell you this now I've left, I wrote all of 'notes from the road', most of 'switch' and all the other crap in quiet moments at work. I'd write everything in a textpad document and email back to my personal email account. Now I don't have that oppoutunity(at the moment). Oh well, the job itself is much more challenging so I guess I'll have to start writing at home! Boo!

This weekends been quite quiet so far badders on Friday followed by watching late night tv with beer (alcohol is the only sensible solution to Friday night tv) Went to another garden centre yesterday morning (I am, in fact, fifty) then hung out with some friends we haven't seen since the wedding and persuaded another couple to buy a Wii (at this point I'm wondering how much commission I need to charge nintendo!) then watched England struggle and strain to turn France over in the rugby semi final.

Hey ho, although if England do retain the world cup I'll be turning my tv off for at least a month to let the commentators Hyperbole die down. Nothing against England but imagine if you supported Everton and EVERY SINGLE COMMENTATOR WAS PRAISING EVERY MOVE LIVERPOOL MADE. It would piss you off after a while. It may in fact happen as I'd far rather watch the world paint drying championships than watch football. Every year we go to a barbeque on FA cup final day and I'll watch the game to remind myslef why I don't watch the games. And then I'll fall comfortably asleep in the second half knowing I won't miss anything.

I didn't always feel this way, when I worked in Liverpool it was the football chat every day. But not any more. I've seen the light!

A long day ahead of family visits, six solid hours of gaming with The Pedantic Crew (We roll four deep), finished off with Chinese food and Argentina versus South Africa or as I like to call it, heaven.

saturdaze

I will update more later but I just wanted to point you towards this photoblog. Basically this person scours the internet for the most interesting /funny pictures such as the one above. If you have ten mins take a look back these some amazing stuff on there!

Works going well but it very different to the last place. The last place had highs and lows of busyness which gave me plenty of time to think and write but this new place is constantly busy but you feel less rushed which is definaetly a good thing!

correction to previous post.

It has been pointed out to me that the last post was very harsh on the Aussies.

When Wales played them in September we met two distinct types of australian.

1. Were friendly happy and genuinely great people. Perfect blokes and shelias to share a beer with and I would cheerfully recommend their company to anyone.

2. Were cunts.

The post below was directed at the second group.

That is all.

Dreamz

(If you don't care about rugby you should probably skip forward to the next post.)


You are NEVER going to believe the dream I had last night! In defiance of all the known laws of both God and Man, both France AND England beat the supposedly superior teams of New Zealand and Australia to reach the semi finals of the World cup. It was so vivid but I know it was clearly a dream as I was supporting England against the cheating dirty whinging Aussies. What was the excuse this time Austrialia? Did you put your under 15 squad out? Or was that your full strength team being DEMOLISHED by the England front row in the manner they practiced against the Welsh before the world cup?



WHAT? You mean that beautiful dream is real? Thank you God! Thank you Jehova! Thank you Tom Cruise!


Define Irony. Irony is talking yourself up to the press that you're going to win the word cup and then getting beaten by a side that got killed against South Africa 36-nil. Its a beautiful day.

football booties

So, for the past couple of years ive played footie in a knackered pair of trainers that saw their best days sometime last century. "time for some new ones" me thinks and off to the shoe shop. Except EVERY pair of football boots are so garish the shelf in the shop looks like the bottom of a clowns wardrobe.

When did the footballers wives take over the design of footballers boots?

They are so bad im going to grab my old ones out of the bin and give them another go. With a healthy dose of deodorant, of course!

So it turns out no one has access to the internet at work unless you're so high up the food chain you're unlikely to spend the afternoon waiting for updates on the bbc.

HOWEVER the job itself is much more indepth than my previous roles I have had no time to miss the aforementioned internet access expect for the updating of blogs. Not that I was ever a regular contributor to my own blog but I expect the updates will become even more patchy as I now have to turn on my pc when I get home which lets face it is unlikely to happen on a whim.

The rain came down thisafternoon like God was pissed. and yet people still insited on driving less than a meter from the car in front on the motorway. Maybe its becuase I've been driving on b roads to work up until now but some of these guys are seriously nuts! Like they're immortal and desperate for an excuse to buy a new car.

Scary scaaaaary stuff.

The world of ties is not made better by frequent use. I would have thought I'd have been getting used to my collar and leash by now but even the fact they come in a wide variety of shapes and colours does not disminish how tied down I feel.

The people are still nice and the work itself is really interesting. Well you'd find it dull as a bastard but I like it.

Apart from that not much else is going on.

Laters.




(Phew! I managed to get through the entire thing without mentioning the rugby.)

(DOH!)

new job

New job. No email access yet. No net access at all. Its also a Tie-rarchy, where the wearing of ties is mandatory.
I havent worn a tie regularly since school and my neck is rebelling! People are nice thou and the job should be fine. More later.