Failure to lunch

Basically, November has been an unmitigated disaster. In the sense that nothing spectacular has happened, and the huge goals set for the month (complete a draft of a 50,000 word novel for NaNoWriMo, grow an exemplary moustache raising loads of Moula for charity, get closer to a solid plan set for the 'top secret I've told everyone I'd love to do it' Route 66 bike dream) have all passed me by in an unnassuming and mediocre fashion. I've fallen into the middle ground of unexciting but bearable and pretty easy life, being mediocre and happy to let that happen. I've raised £26 for Movember. Reached just over 35,000 words for NaNoWriMo. And put together lists, sorted budgets and planned dates by which certain things have to have happened for the trip next year. But they're all just 'alright' things. There's been no huge leap forward or giant, spectacular event to really get them going. Why? Life.

My Movember Diary (Or 'It's not just dirt above my lip honest')- Day 7

Day 7

The "Is-that-even-hair?" face

Okay, so the idea of a day to day photo diary of my Mo journey was well and truly shot down when, on days two through to five there was very little change in the smooth surface of my face. So it'll be coming a week at a time.

I haven't put a photo on my actual MoBro page yet- so unworthy a 'tache it is. And I've raised a grand total of £0 so far, as many people at work have mentioned ( and I agree with this idea) that money will come my way when a)they get paid and b) there is something mighty enough on my face to be seen. So stay tuned for next week, when it'll be properly visible.

Donate here- http://uk.movember.com/mospace/1901064/

Our engineers are working hard to resolve this problem...

Hello again, all. Due to a recent increase in my daytime activities thanks to gainful communicative effort in a society of business and the commencement of involvement in a national social event there will be no Sunday Evening Read review on this day.

Basically, I've been buggered for time trying to up my wordcount for NaNoWriMo this weekend after work. So I haven't managed a book review. Don't worry, I've already got the book in mind, read and re-read it recently and have plenty to say, so it will be up next Sunday. Here's a hint- it's horror, written by a modern author, and involves the Moon somewhere in its title.

In the next seven days I promise I'll have it written up and scheduled. In the meantime, happy November! If we all wish it enough, it might finally start getting frosty and cold 'dahn sahf' like this time of year should be.

We apologise for this interruption...

There will be no Graphic Novel Review today. In between the determined concentration behind trying to force hair out of my face so I don't look like a fraud for Movember, the flurry of words, keys and pen against paper that is NaNoWriMo, and a few other things, I haven't had time to finish reading Neil Gaiman's The Sandman Vol. 4: Season of Mists.

So, I'll get to reading it in the few moments I have free now, and normal service will be resumed next week with a review of it. It might be worth a wait, I couldn't say just yet

In a messed-up wo-o-orld...

Hi everyone, cheers for popping by- this is a second quick update between the pub, NaNoWriMo and sleep, but I feel it's important to post because it's pretty disgusting yet phenomenal that people would go as far as to do such a thing.

I direct you to this link here, featuring real life Barbie Feet.

I don't want to go into the why's and wherefores, the contexts and containing features, the reality and the "what if?"s and the wonderings. I'll just spread word, via io9, via this link, of the horrifyingly real pedicural, perambulatory problems being pushed on owners of feet everywhere. They might not exist yet, but when they do...

Support this as & when you can- http://mobro.co/ChrisHousden

Tolkien didn't just write- he drew, too

Hi everyone, cheers for popping by- this is a quick update between the pub, NaNoWriMo and sleep, but I feel it's important to post because it's pretty cool. Like Tolkien, and the histories he wrote? Take a looksie...

Never seen original concepts of the Lonely Mountain before?

It includes loads of great artwork you'd never see anywhere else, unless you paid phenomenal amount for books with artwork. Surely worth a look?

My Movember Diary (Or 'It's not just dirt above my lip honest')- Day 1

Day 1- Bare-faced

Shaved it all off and I'm now clean shaven, a blank canvas upon which to grow a masterpiece.

Donate here- http://mobro.co/ChrisHousden

The November Experiment- see you on the other side

So I graduated a few months ago, I've got around to the pay-off of weeks of soul destroying job hunting and a naff unpaid placement in the form of a pretty sweet job, and I'm starting to plan properly a trip somewhere abroad which I've had in mind for ages to take place next year.

Things are looking up and up. And tonight sees the end of October. It heralds the beginning of November. A month in which two organised, month-long events are held which I have, in the past, ignored or shied away from as taking up too much time or being "not for me". Well, no more. As of tomorrow I'm correcting the imbalance of writing I've been doing by embarking on NaNoWriMo.

I'm also shaving my beard and 'tache off, for the reason of getting a clean slate for Movember. From that blank canvas a mighty handlebar shall grow. I may end up looking like Rufus Hound. Or being beaten up.

If I'm not dead from trying to write a novel in a month or from attackers objecting to the facial hair I shall cultivate, I'll see you on the other side.

Also, you can check up on the writing here- http://www.nanowrimo.org/, searching for CJMK2

and can donate to the cause for prostate and testicular cancer research here- http://mobro.co/ChrisHousden. Please give, even a little.

Catch-up TV Triple- Spooks and the Smiley series- why le Carré is wrong to snub the show so.

Spooks finished this weekend, culminating a storyline of intrigue, subverted Cold War tradition, intelligence and action with an episode which drew on double-takes and the embittering of those involved to deliver a stunning, intelligent and un-secondguessable outcome.

Le Carré vocally derided the show about a month ago as juvenile and not at all like the intelligence services that he depicts in his fiction or that he was a part of professionally.

Following on in the vein of arguing against Margaret Atwood's ill-informed assessment of science fiction and attempt to redefine it so she could categorise her work as realist, literary fiction, I'm inclined to disagree with le Carré's assessment of Spooks. I'm also inclined to have a bit of a rant here discussion over just what is so different, in his eyes, between the popular show and the popular books, stopping off at a little point wondering why yet another author is so disinclined to be associated with a sub-genre of entertaining fiction and wants, instead, to be revered as the ultimate high brow incarnation of that sub-genre to the point where it is absorbed into the literary fiction which is all that is worthy of being read in the author's mind.

Catch-up TV Triple- Too soon for a storytelling? Biopics on 20th century talents

Why biopic recent history to the point where the character or focal personae are still alive? I recently saw Frost/ Nixon and, more recently, Holy Flying Circus. I've also seen the original programmes of Frost interviewing Nixon and pretty much all of Python that's available. It made me start thinking- is either film worth doing? If so, what's the point in them changing things?

I'll say this- like with so many of my posts, this isn't going to have a definitive answer. To the point where I've actually said as much before we go on.

Dramatic licence and creative adaptation are all well and good. But when it comes to Frank Langella shouting "When the president does it, it's not illegal" while the real Nixon merely stated it as quiet fact in the true interview, all for the purposes of a crescendo, a turning of the tables in the dramatised debate, is it really worth it? If you want that, then have it. But make a political drama, write a new story, in which such an event occurs. Don't change history. More importantly, don't change what was a great, subtle moment in the undoing of Nixon by Frost. It cheapens the very interview it was inspired by.

It was a similar affair, but much more widely and liberally apportioned, with Holy Flying Circus. This 'dramatic re-telling', as it was marketed, of the furore around The Life of Brian felt as though it was trying too hard to be Python-esque in the weird and whacky but organic way that they were, in the same way that Eoin Colfer's And Another Thing tried to hard to capture the absurd humour of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Trilogy (of Five). The end result was something forced, a bit of a mess.

Catch-up TV Triple- Is it me, or are House and HIMYM losing their edge?

Okay. It's a definite "yes" that HIMYM is not the show it was for, arguably, the first three series of its run. It's dipped, the way Friends did, the way Scrubs did, but this time I don't think it's going to "pull a Scrubs" and haul it back for a good couple of series to finish it all (the reboot-esque series nine doesn't count). But having tried to keep an open mind as the sitcom opened onto its seventh series that it might rally, its only dropped further. The inclusion of Kal Penn as main character Robin Scherbatsky's therapist-cum-boyfriend Kevin is frankly appalling. Overacting masterclasses could be run by him, as evidenced by his delivery of almost every 'comedy' line he has, the pinnacle of which has to be "Without laptops". And this reaction.

Sunday Evening Reads- The Deep Range

This week, a bit more on time than last week's idiocy- and oversight-delayed Smiley's People review, some thoughts on The Deep Range by Arthur C. Clarke.

Really, it's a rubbish title. As Clarke's titles go, this describes very little of what the book holds- 2001: A Space Odyssey, Rendezvous With Rama, they both encapsulate the story within them, the concept. With The Deep Range, Clarke misses most of what happens, and doesn't bookend the story inside; that, though, is probably because for once he isnt writing a high-concept populated by machinery masquerading as character. For once, he manages a story, with emotions, fleshed-out characters, not just ciphers and types used to illustrate the alienness of the story's focus.

Passing Comment- Vincent Tabak and Jo Yeates

Oh good. So once again, Media on murderer Wham! home some point or other. Altogether now- "Last Christmas a girl was murdered, and the very next day the papers had their say". Remember this real-life audience participation murder mystery? It seems the media aren't finished with it yet.

I thought all of the really morbid "come and watch with us" stuff had finished. Not so. I'm looking at you, BBC.

How sensationalist can you get? With a headline like Vincent Tabak 'viewed violent web porn' it's really going to avoid the whole culture of trial by media, isn't it? That helps, honestly, it really helps.

Graphic Novel Review- John Constantine, Hellblazer: Scab

This week, time for something completely different- Vertigo Comics's John Constantine, Hellblazer: Scab, written by Peter Milligan and illustrated by Giuseppe Camuncoli and Stefano Landini (Scab arc), and Goran Sudzuka and Rodney Ramos (Regeneration arc). It also features the very short story The Curse of Christmas, which Eddie Campbell (who most sites cannot mention without From Hell coming up- has he done anything else?) illustrated for Milligan.

As with many of the reviews I've looked at this evening for Scab, to see what other people thought of it, this wouldn't have been a graphic novel Id have thought of looking at. I'm told it collects the issues at the beginning of Peter Milligan's tenure overseeing the Hellblazer title, which is neither here nor there for me, but I had been meaning to get into the Constantine world for a while- so what with it being the Hellblazer title the public library have here I thought I'd give it a whirl.

Aside from an awareness of John Constantine being a Brit, a Scouser, gritty, a smoker and a walker of the line between urban realism and demons, magic and curses, and the general nerd knowledge, coming with being a film geek and frequenter of the internet, that Hollywood screwed up the whole thing with Keanu 'Stoneface' Reeves and the abominable 2005 flick Constantine, this was my first foray into his story. It was a mixed experience.

Sunday Evening Reads- Smiley's People

Right, I'm sorry this has gone up on a Monday evening instead of a Sunday, as it should be- truth be told I committed a brilliant bit of idiocy yesterday and, after piling in all the necessary HTML for links and shiz, previewing and re-previewing, I left this review sat as a draft. Then I went to bed, went to work, and came back to realise that far from being published where it could only be seen by the wayward, the confused and the imaginary people that make up my readers, it was in fact buried in the bowels of Blogspot, where it could never be seen by anyone. So sorry about that, senior moments get at even the most youthful 21-year-olds. Here you go.

This week we're I'm looking at the third in John Le Carré's Karla trilogy, Smiley's People.

Following last week's discovery of the minimalist, similar-to-sketching style with which Hemingway wrote A Farewell to Arms it's revealing to return to Le Carre's portrayal of the eponymous Smiley, written in a similarly muted manner. The novel itself airs on the descriptive and possesses a certain flair, too much so to be compared to Hemingway, but the key to Smiley's People, as is true of both the prequels to it, is the way in which Smiley is written. You have to read him as though you are in the room with him, each little tic, gesture or look that Smiley gives, or the absence of them and the stillness of the passive listener, has to be taken on board.

Passing Comment: Dale Farm

Okay, I'm tired and still have a fair few things to do before bed and getting up to go to work again tomorrow, so I haven't the energy to go into a full-blown serious post about news stories, about which I have quite a bit to say but most of it is boring guff. Which struck me with a brilliant idea. I'll hit it at a glance like a branch and see what conkers, startled birds and dead spiders fall out, in a section entitled Passing Comment- because, obviously, it's a hilarious pun lightning-bolted into my brain by inspiration. You know, because I'll be making a comment, but it will be fleeting...? Never mind.

Topic of the day? Dale Farm.

I've followed this loosely in the news. I knew it was happening. Nothing seemed hugely odd about it. I flicked through this slideshow just now. Flick through it now, before reading on. Done that?

Graphic Novel Review- The Dark Knight Returns

The Dark Knight Returns, written by Frank Miller and pencilled by him, too.

In short, I love it. But there are some things I could stand to see improved. Or, you know, done differently.

Finally- we might have lift off.

Or at least, a countdown isn't far off as ignition lights the boosters.

Really nothing to say here except that you can find out why the links below are relevant in these typings, where I have bemoaned at length a great many things space- and space program-related.

NASA and Virgin Galactic discuss collaboration on a new model of spacecraft, fuelling my hopes (and those of many around the interweb) that privatised space programsaren't an impossibility.

The world's first (of, hopefully, many) commercial spaceport opens.

Sunday Evening Reads- A Farewell to Arms

After the (relative) success of the Graphic Novel Wednesday reviews launched a few weeks ago, I'm setting up a book review a week to go out on Sundays. And much like the Graphic Novel segment it won't be all about reviewing brand new releases, brilliantly cutting edge texts or specifically those regarded as classics- I'll be reviewing books I'm reading, whether they were released last week or last century, whether they were huge hits or are largely ridiculed, or anything in between. I've got a horribly eclectic taste, so you probably won't like many of the titles, but you never know, you might spot something you fancy having a peruse of yourself. Why Sundays? Well, what better day of the week to curl up next to an imaginary fireplace on an evening with a good book?

The first review, then, is Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.

It's the first Hemingway I've read apart from a short story entitled A Clean, Well-Lighted Place. And coming to Hemingway for the first time took a fair bit of adjustment. His sparse, bare-faced style of prose just didn't draw me in initially, not holding my attention with a lack of with its lack of description, a lack of adjectives and adverbs that made it seem incredibly simple and, if I'm honest, a bit boring. The fact that his narration is pure and efficient was lost on me, with simplistic sentences such as "The light shone on their hats" being too abrupt and too frequent for an eye used to skipping through chunks of poorly written exposition or unnecessary details about the building in which the characters are stood in order to glean the important points.

With Hemingway though, as I realised after about forty pages, everything is important.

The Great Wine Conspiracy

In recent weeks I have made a few purchases on Amazon using portions of the £50 I have been donated every week by Her Majesty's government in return for being a bum. Nothing extravagant, just T-shirts and such like. Vouchers from two different wine companies offering me 50% plus off a crate of their wine. Incidentally, or coincidentally, or perhaps no great coincidence at all, On Monday I start work at the Stevenage-based nationally renowned cooperative known only as The Wine Society. What if there's more to this sudden influx of winery, vino and generosity? What if there's a network, a grapevine on which the powers that be have begun an offensive?

I say this not only as a fan of spies and having the eternal little boy inside my head who wants to be Bond, but I set to wondering after a few friends over the last few years have joked around that I'm some sort of international man of mystery. Secretive is not something I'd describe myself as, but apparently I am. These observations weren't helped by my "expressing an interest" in MI5 near the end of our last year of university, oh so many moons ago (a few months). So maybe my writer's imagination and this skew towards secretive industries is fuelling this little whimsy that is being typed out here.

Graphic Novel Review- Civil War

Firstly this week I'll address something- for the pedants among us, I'm aware that in reviewing some one-shot series alongside collections of issues all relating to one storyline arc but published across different in-universe series I'm playing fast and loose with the term graphic novel. However, according to Wikipedia, [Show][Hide]
the term is not strictly defined, though one broad dictionary definition is "a fictional story that is presented in comic-strip format and presented as a book."[3] In the publishing trade, the term is sometimes extended to material that would not be considered a novel if produced in another medium. Collections of comic books that do not form a continuous story, anthologies or collections of loosely related pieces, and even non-fiction are stocked by libraries and bookstores as "graphic novels" (similar to the manner in which dramatic stories are included in "comic" books). It is also sometimes used to create a distinction between works created as stand-alone stories, in contrast to collections or compilations of a story arc from a comic book series published in book form.

So there we are. I'm going to keep using it to apply to both collected works and one-shots, which is just as well as this week we're back to Marvel, for there big in-universe crossover collection Civil War, written by Mark Millar and pencilled by Steve McNiven, who incidentally produced Old Man Logan reviewed a few weeks ago. The Civil War storyline doesn't just span the seven issues collected in the main graphic novel but has subsidiary issues based around several of the players in the storyline, creating a gigantic sprawling fixed point similar to DC Comics' Crisis crossover. For the purposes of this review, though, we're concentrating on the seven issues collected into one volume. If you don't like politics in your comics, look away now.

Margaret Atwood- science fiction should be fantasy; I do not write fantasy, therefore it is not science fiction

I'm no expert in science fiction, not a professional of the history of the genre or anything like that. I've not got degrees in the thing or been asked to be a talking head on Newsnight Review. But I have read a lot of science fiction, I have read a lot of fantasy, I've watched films and TV shows that fall into the categories, seen documentaries on both, and honestly know a fair bit about it. Seeing as I've got all that behind me I'm hoping that this post doesn't come across as just some ignorant, angry man behind a keyboard but strays somewhere close to a legitimate, well informed line of argument. Basically, I'm going to rant but it's got some good stuff in there so slug it out and read the damn thing. Pretty please.

Margaret Atwood has written some profound and enduringly popular books during her career, not least my favourite of her works, The Handmaid's Tale. I read The Handmaid's Tale around the same time that I read We by Yevgeny Zamyatin and Children of Men by P.D. James, two highly regarded dystopian novels revolving around society's breakdown or fatal flaws. They are both regarded as science fiction, to greater or lesser extents, as most dystopian works are- the "hard science" of social experimentation and social science is the basis, however loose, for roughly half of all dystopian fiction, sharing the genre with disaster/ accident/ catastrophe (which, incidentally, then fuels a socially focused story, after the cause of the current state of affairs). At the time I couldn't help grouping these three books together in my mind- similar themes ran through all of them, and they all felt largely the same.

Even now they come as a set in my mind when I refer to them, and it's little wonder why; I probably picked them up in the library as a group because of their very similarities. So why is the author of one of them, The Handmaid's Tale, keen to inform everyone that it is in fact not science fiction, and wouldn't be unless it was entirely implausible and possibly had dragons?

Graphic Novel Review- Batman: Year One

I missed a week, yes, only two weeks in. This should explain why- I was too knackered to do anything other than eat, spend hours looking for work, go to bed.

Taking a break from Marvel this week with the first review foray into DC for this segment. At a time when the gods that be have just decided to completely reboot all DC titles from issue 1, completely retconning many details that identify their characters from the last 60/70 years, and when a distinctly bizarre new Batman cartoon has been announced (what I assume will be the typical nerd reaction can be found here, a more measured response is here), it seems as good a moment as any to take a look at the world's greatest detective.

So, we're going back to the "beginning" of one of the greatest characters comics to have been created- Batman. That is, the birth of the character continuity-wise, not the first appearance in an issue of Detective Comics from the 30s. And yet, Batman: Year One (written by Frank Miller, illustrated by David Mazzucchelli and coloured by Richard Lewis) is more about James Gordon than the eponymous caped crusader. Confusing? A little. But is it worth a look?

Another small step, or fear of the Frontier?

Last week NASA published a report, which probably took thousands of man hours and millions of dollars to research and compile, telling the US government that were the market to be opened up to the assistance of industries and businesses, the private sector could operate a space program a billion times better than NASA is doing. Broadly speaking. It found that were there competition among private companies and cooperation among others the vessels and craft we use, the technologies applied to travel both to and within the vacuum or near vacuum of space and the costs involved would all be improved upon dramatically, in relatively short time.

Now, yes, I have a bit of a history of following headlines about space and then ranting and rambling. Naturally I've got a few things to say about this revelation. Mainly that it's what I've been saying all along.

London Jaunt- When in doubt, use your fancy dress as bedding.

St. George's University, Tooting. An SU in a hospital. England winning rugby against a good Scotland. The works.

Thankfully at the time of writing no photographic evidence of myself in a toga or attempting to dance in said toga had come to light on the old book of face. It may yet, but until then in blissful denial shall I remain.

Headlining Fleet Street: Time, gentlemen.

Well, after last week's confession that I was getting bored by it all, and having worked a week more, I came to a decision. There will be no more posts in this series, no more Headlining Fleet Street. I packed it all in. I feel a little bit like a quitter to have done that, but there you are- it wasn't worth my unpaid, desperately-in-need-of-earnings time.

Sometimes, you rush into things without asking anything about them and then wonder why it's all a bit naff. I was so happy to be offered anything that I did exactly this. I was misled. And have since started and failed to continue in a position that was unrelated to anything.

Led to believe I'd be helping write and edit their daily business newswire, in reality I was an unpaid glorified record-keeper updating a back catalogue of company profiles. Those of banks. Internationally, to the point where I was wading through annual reports awash with percentages and figures and German, or Spanish, or Portuguese. Indecipherable was the watchword. I felt a bit like I was trying to read the Matrix and figure out what was going on, and then when I realised what the numbers meant I had to find a dozen fresh ways to say "banks are buggered".

It's a damn bloody shame. I wanted to be part of something related to what I want to go into, in the broad area of online news, writing for websites, learning about new things. Instead I went to Fleet Street and became an unpaid bank researcher. So there we have it.

Manchester Jaunt! (Jaunt series special!)

Including a guest appearance by the lovely locale known as "Marple, as in Miss".

Folks, I've never been to Manchester before this. I've been through it, got off and sat at Machester Piccadilly before, in first year I even had a pretty good meeting with someone looking for a writer at a hotel just next to the station, but they don't really count, do they? So it was with a little trepidation (and the hope that the weather held) that I ventured back up north after the summer to attend the birthday drunkenness of my dear friend Mr A Taylor. A man of wordiness and wit far beyond mine, who also shares a love of whiskeys, and who was turning 23.

Headlining Fleet Street: That Friday Feeling (a pint thereof)

Oh my god. It's been a mad couple of weeks, which seem to have been spent mostly on trains. Let me take you back to the beginning. I've been keeping it all up to date in fragments but it's not been presentable(-ish) until now.

Hastily sketched out on Friday 23rd September- No sign of fainting girl- for those the missed it, my moment of shining glory can be found here. Should have seized the moment and ridden the rescuer vibe when I could, I fear. Onto the actual role- good God it's boring. Banks are not my cup of tea, it seems, but I can swallow any bitter medicine should it make me better or get me money, to extend the metaphor. This won't do either, so I think the days of my time there are numbered. A job, anything involving money, is needed over an internship at the moment, methinks.

Written in first free moment since then-
As mentioned above, this internship isn't entirely what I thought I'd be doing. I suppose nothing ever is, especially when working for free.

Headlining Fleet Street: Call me Florence Nightingale (no, really, call me. Please?)

Day two of the News-based Internship!.

Firstly, I'm convinced Idris Elba was driving our Tube today. When he apologised over the intercom for the delay, “due to a train… on the section ahead”, I fully expected him to start berating someone called Alice.

Secondly, I should probably learn first aid or something. When a girl fainted on me on the train

It's rude to point. Don't point your finger at me, don't know where it's been.

Before going any further, read this. That way what I'm about to say will make sense.

DISCLAIMER- I will acknowledge/ allow that in light of certain other huge changes Facebook wheeled out over yesterday and today (depending on when Zuckerberg changed yours) the removal of one button pales into ridiculousness. Still, there you are.

As I was saying, I was shown this the other day, because I clicked on a link to it after a Twitter-user retweeted someone's re-tweet of a link to a blog. Confused? Such are the gateway times we live in, internet user. Anyway, it got me thinking about the elusive, mysterious "Poke".

Graphic Novel Review- Wolverine: Old Man Logan

That's right, after last week's Wolverine: Origin we're here at the end, Wolverine: Old Man Logan, written by Mark Millar with art by Steve McNiven. You can catch that review here, bub.

Story-wise, it actually manages to do something original with the idea of an old man coming out of retirement for one last job

News-based Internship! Breaking the business, take two

So, I've landed an internship at a news wire. It's in London, Fleet Street to be precise, and it's a bit like a deja vu where you know the last time you did it wasn't as good as this one, inexplicably. I felt much less like a fraud standing on the underground platform a year on, maybe because I've matured, maybe because of my slick new haircut. Maybe because it's a bit more of a serious stab at getting into the business. That said, I still felt a bit of a fraud, looking around at all the worn down commuters in suits and faces pinstriped with age, only much less of one.

"There shall be wings! If the accomplishment be not for me, 'tis for some other."- Da Vinci

It turns out that the future of space exploration may not be as dead in the water as previously indicated.

Coming Soon- "Promised Manned Mission to Mars, Or how a giant rocket will make everyone forget about the Moon missions and the current lack of any space program".

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/biggest-ever-rocket-man-mars-160357782.html

After the interval- "One Year Until First Commercial Space Flight, Or Branson reckons billionaires will be whizzing about quicker than holidaymakers fleeing mansions on fire".
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/virgin-aims-first-space-launch-within-044339875.html

All jokes aside, why not have a sort of privateer space race? I'd like to see more independent companies beginning space programs. Imagine the development Honda could do, for Christ's sake! Privatised space travel would force government agencies such as NASA to compete. A sort of space race for peace time. I wouldn't go so far as to say that focussing on space travel will bring world peace, but some experts have said as much. I'd say that while the technology powerhouses and scientists are focussed on the great "out there", at least they won't be concentrating on new ways to blow people up.

If anything, it would give us a little bit more of a hold on this stay our species has booked at the Hotel Universe- as Robert Heinlein said, "The Earth is just too small and fragile a basket for the human race to keep all its eggs in." And if nothing else, it would encourage other designs and shapes of craft to be drawn up and, hopefully, take over from the spindly-winged Branson-Batwing. I still reckon it looks stupid.

Graphic Novel Review- Wolverine: Origin

A quick defence of the genre and medium, before we begin. Sometimes (quite commonly) people sniff at graphic novels and turn their noses up.

If done properly it’s the ultimate visual medium. Even silent films had sound effects and hurdy-gurdy music played live on location. With a graphic novel every detail of the story, including the characters present, the plot developments, the mood of the moment, all of them have to be recognisably drawn into the panel or written into the dialogue. At least 60% of the story is told by the artwork.

So seeing as I have a small amount of money injected into my account every fortnight and the freedom with which to set my own reading agenda instead of having Woolf inflicted upon me I am reigniting my passion for graphic novels. I will be reviewing one a week, with the reviews being posted every Wednesday to try to give the blog a more permanent structure. I hope that for the people reading this measly drop in the ocean of personal blogs on the planet Internet it is interesting and perhaps a little enlightening, and maybe convinces you to have a go at broadening your own reading outside of the medium of purely written storytelling and into something a little more diverse.

Now, I don’t have anywhere near enough money to get as many graphic novels as I’d like or even enough to accurately represent even a tenth of the entire genre, so I’ll be buying things according to my taste rather than trying to cover the “greats”. Sometimes the two will inevitably overlap, but this feature will be more or less a rogues’ gallery of things I thought worth a pop.

And so we begin with Wolverine: Origin, written by Bill Jemas, Joe Quesada and Paul Jenkins, and pencilled by Andy Kubert and coloured by Richard Isanove.

"Are you sure you buried Heather all in one place?" ITV Drama Review- Appropriate Adult

ITV and Channel 4 turn out some great drama based on things that have really happened, the extremes of the human condition. Compared to the stories BBC occasionally create that glimmer among the diatribe of soaps and "continuing drama" like Waterloo Road, they tend to be about true crime or disturbingly written dramas such as Red Riding, pushing what can be done and told on TV.

More than a few echoes of Longford, in which Jim Broadbent shone, as he always does. Perhaps it was the continuous prison visitations or just the sense of someone who should know better being drawn into the web of lies and seduction woven by a serial killer as Longford experienced with Myra Hindley and Leach found with Fred West, or the nature of the crimes, but they mirrored well. Standing up in comparison to Longford, Appropriate Adult unfortunately fell a little short.

A home from home that's too big, a bit too hot and sticky- the old, budget hotel of planets, then.

News just in this afternoon- there is an exoplanet that has been discover which is probably habitable, though not very easily. It would be like living in a sauna, apparently, and while that'd be great for your complexion for a while it would eventually be terrible for any buildings/ semi-permanent settlements. For shame.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't at least look at it, though, in case we need to leave within the fairly small interstellar window of the next 250 years. As many scientists and sci-fi authors have said, the future of the human race is not on one planet, and probably not this one. So, onwards! To the catchily named HD85512B!

"Kids, sometimes a TV show can be a bit different"- How I Met Your Mother, the series so far

I recently had the opportunity spare time, solitude and, despite my best efforts, nights of insomnia after days spent monotonously applying for job after job after job with which to indulge in a little catching up on recent television. I caught a couple of episodes of a series called How I Met Your Mother, and despite not getting into it before I decided to begin at the beginning after a couple of series four episodes tickled my funnybones.

I have since seen all six series, and found them incredibly refreshing among the relentless Everyone Loves Raymonds, Accidentally On Purposes and Just Shoot Mes of American situation comedy. Which has been timed brilliantly, as series 7 is being aired from the 19th of September (next Monday) on CBS in the States*, so what better moment to post a rundown of the things that make the show a little bit different and give it such quality?

My family went to Italy...

And all they brought me back was this lousy... Oh, wait. It's actually pretty nice.

Valuev searching for long lost brother

Yes, folks and folkettes, this rare dip into commenting on the sporting world concerns the recent news that Nikolai Valuev is going to lead an expedition to find that rarest of cryptids, the "Russian Yeti".

Possible sighting of the Kazzbuss yeti.

He's going to Siberia for two days to hunt the beast

Lifting the gay blood-giving ban- "a step in the right direction", but not there yet

This news woke me at seven this morning. In my dozing, bleary state I acknowledged it with a smile and remember thinking that it was pretty monumental, given that yesterday there was no mention that such a decision was being made and that it was the fourth or fifth item on the bulletin. For almost thirty years any man who is gay and sexually active has been banned from donating blood, and finally the realisation has dawned on the health care professionals constantly pleading for more donors to step forward that "the ban could no longer be justified", according to the BBC.

I read up on the story on the BBC website, and have so say that while it makes an excellent soundbyte, the fact that "the life-long ban on gay men donating blood has been lifted" doesn't really address or cover the story. There's much more to it, and it's not necessarily as huge a leap forward as is perhaps being made out by "snippet news." It's worth reading the BBC story before reading any further here- it can be found at:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14824310

Done that? Read on-

We don't have the technology, we can't rebuild... your face

Listen up marketing and advertising gurus of the TV world. There's a gigantic bone I'm going to pick, with all of you, right now. So pay attention.

We do not have nanobots at the beck and call of every cosmetics company. So seriously, stop telling me that every cream, facepack, deoderant,shampoo and toothpaste is full of patented technology, illustrated by an animation in which cells or spheres move autonomously across the skin/ teeth/ hair. It doesn't happen, and won't happen within our lifetimes.

Bobbies getting beats if thinktank has its way

We don't live in an era where that's safe any more. Of course we don't. If coppers were to leave the house in full regalia and get the train, most people wouldn't bat an eyelid. But there will be the few, the few who see that one of their neighbours or a local man is leaving his house as a policeman, the few who see a lone copper on the train and taunt him as he's not on duty. The elderly and other neighbours would, perhaps, treat them with the respect that matches the respect villagers in Dock Green treated the proverbial Dixon, but only if they knew them.

"I don't do violence and guns." BBC Drama Review- Page Eight

Now this is more like it. BBC drama that actually entertains, breaks a few boundaries and doesn't sit in a nice little familiar niche. Yup, Page Eight was brilliant.

Intelligence officer Johnny Worricker, and possibly sinister neighbour Nancy Pierpan

In a nutshell- Old school espionage, relying on information and intelligence rather than clues garnered from the top secret computer, the password to which was guessed by looking at the penthouse address or super-villain's favourite book. Less adventure-based than current fare and yet more tensely put together.

Creepy, predictable and ultimately over too soon

There are two things that immediately bring that triumvirate of descriptions to mind: nighttime fumblings with Piers Morgan and the latest episode of Doctor Who, "Night Terrors" by Mark Gatiss. One of them is going to be reviewed, discussed and rated here as I've experienced it. But which?

Life Update- Haven't got a job yet

I don't normally do progress reports on things that have happened in my life. This blog was designed to be mainly about current affairs and things that I have come across, books, plays, films and the like, and then to use those as the substance which my witty cynicism and occasionally misplaced dislike is a foil to. I can't really stand talking about day-to-day stuff, or reading other "personal blogs".

London Jaunt- Metropolitan, dahlings. I'm too important to walk that far.

It was a friend's birthday this week, the friend who showed a mutual friend of ours around London for their first time (with my help/ goofing about) the other week in the first of these London Juants. Therefore, this weekend, there were cocktails to be had at a swanky, "in" bar in the capital. Capital!

It was called Be@One. I'm reliably informed that there are several establishments under this bar's umbrella dotted around London. I can safely say I'd never been in one before, but it's charmingly welcoming in that it is tiny, everyone seems to be happy and friendly in there (happy hour lasts from 4:30, opening, to 7:00) and they serve a killer Vesper that would make anyone think they were Bond, James Bond.

London Jaunt- It's life, but not as we know it

The British Library has two exhibitions on at the moment concerning things that are made up, speculative fiction and typically ancient literary traditions. One is the Out of this World science-fiction exhibition, while the other is the more permanent display of the British Library Treasures, its collection including: great religious texts from around the world such as gospels, bibles and Qu'rans; Chinese scrolls and texts; tomes of early poetry and Chaucer; Jane Austen's writing desk and manuscripts; a whole lot more, including Beatles notes.

They are both well worth looking at. I went the other day, in another London Jaunt to make myself feel better/ drag me out of my room and away from the relentless job application process, and it was immense. The best part- it's free.

Keeping busy, moving along

I wrote a post a few weeks ago now about how people use their time now that the vast majority of us have descended from "student" to "unemployed bum".

I've settled a bit more into the routine of not having much to do other than collect dole, look for work, create things for self to do. I can't say I like it much, but there we are.

Things I am doing to stop myself going mad without an authority figure giving me work are:

And it makes you laugh and it makes you cry, when London falls and you're still alive

So, last week I posted a rather long rant and carefully assembled ribbing of the fact that we're hosting the Olympics in London in a year and haven't got enough transport for the people coming to watch the sports as well as the people who actually live there. The solution that Transport for London suggested was for a set percentage commuters to stop using the Tube for three weeks and work from home. Which, of course, has so far been ridiculed. Now, though, it shouldn't be a problem. There aren't going to be anywhere near as many people wanting to attend the games after all, if any. And that's because of the panic in the streets as hooded youths jump on the back of a protest that went sour on Saturday and decide to do a bit of looting and pillaging instead of having a kick about.

The current state of damage in London looks like this-

with the widespread and untold spats included.

Whoever put this map together deserves credit, especially given the amount of sites not reported by the BBC, Sky or the local police to that borough.

London Jaunt- Sightseeing with a newcomer

It's always nice to show someone who has never been to it around a place you love. It's even better when they seem to genuinely enjoy it and grow to like that place too. I've been the novice before, being showed as a wide-eyed wonderer around Oxford, sitting in The Eagle and Child pub where Tolkein and C.S. Lewis sat, and soaking up the city. Recently, a friend from university, who was staying with a mutual friend of ours as she does "the season" in my favourite city of all time, London, became that novice as the three of us set off around the surprisingly compact network of sights to see in the city.

We met in Covent Garden. I was sat in a nice pub

And the fan-boys are revolting.

Both in the sense that they go ape-shit over the least deviation from their beloved version of a character, and in the sense that many of them look like Comic-book Guy and smell, that is.

But this post isn't about fan-boys being so anal and pedantic about characters who by their very definition as comic-book characters cannot have a definitive version. Not per se. It's more about the crazy things that movie studios do to evoke such backlash, mostly internet-based as they rise up and arm themselves with keyboards, memes and abbreviations which only they understand. It's the antagonism of the studios in releasing a saturation of preview material for their films which I wish to pick a bone with.

Today, for example, the first official picture of Anne Hathaway (smoking hot) as Catwoman (smoking hot and sultry) was released. And the fans went wild.

30,000 heaved from under LC (London City)

Utmost apologies for the pun in the title. Honest, couldn't think of a better one, and I wanted to concentrate on the bulky bit with actual words instead.



Transport for London (TFL) have been bandying about a statement left, right and centre asking ever-so politely if 30,000 commuters wouldn't mind awfully not using the Tube for three weeks next summer. There's a big version of a sports day on, you see, with lots of parents and uncles and aunts coming to see it, and apparently the headteacher-types or governor-types forgot to send a letter around last term, so they haven't had enough time to get the extra ice lollies. Or trains.

Addiction, death, and superstar martyrs

In light of the death of Amy Winehouse there have been so many hours devoted to it on the news that you'd be forgiven for thinking she was well into her dozenth album, had toured into double figures and was far older than her twenty-seven years. Instead, as it has also been widely reported in most stories about her as a positive thing, she had only released two albums. These may have sold excellently, far and wide helped along by the digital age we live in, but they remain two.

Two albums regarded much more highly than perhaps they should be. Though it now appears to be a worse crime than telling many of the dark Sickipedia jokes that have sprung from this (e.g. What was Winehouse's biggest hit? Her last) for her lifelong and posthumously outspoken devotees, I'll fly against the wind. I didn't care for her music. Not the genre, because I love jazz. Not the band, who were great. I didn't care for her voice all that much, she wasn't bad but not the heavenly instrument people made her out to be and have for the last few days insisted upon. It's not a popular opinion, but it's not a cruel one before anyone tries to tell me otherwise. I just don't think she was that good.

NOTW eclipses other, better space-happenings and farewells

It's a sad day today. The reasons for this, much like the reasons for the box, are threefold.

Today, I graduated from university, and it sort of forced me to realise I'm not going back there. Maybe for a few flying visits to see friends in other years or guys and gals who are doing Masters courses or (hats off to them) medicine degrees, but those three years of being immersed there are gone. It's a little more sobering and sad in that because of the university's collegiate system, and the fact that unlike at Oxford and Cambridge college places aren't largely assigned by subject, faculty or discipline, the majority of the people I graduated with I didn't know well and the majority of the people I'd have loved to have seen for a last hurrah were saying their farewell in a silly hat and gown on different days. The few who I knew well and will miss "terribly, everso" from the college were great to chat to, but if all the people I shared a trio of years with could have been there it would have felt a bit less surreal and open-ended, I feel.

So that's the mushy, soft-hearted reason number one out of the way.

Ein experimenten- Ze varied wunderbar effects of having nuzzing to do after university

It's great how different people have reacted to the sudden lack of grounding that is our release from the woes of higher education. I should state in this first paragraph that all of these following observations have been made by myself in both real life and, unfortunately, through the great universally accepted spy-network Facebook

"Strangers don't last long here"- Rango review.

Rango,the first Nickelodeon animated feature film in the same vein as Pixar and Disney have been making for over a decade, comes out on DVD this Friday. Which is good, because it means I'm able to finally publish my review of this exceptional film, the one I started when just after I'd seen it in the cinema months ago. So, seeing as it's high time to give Rango the going over it deserves, let's get started.

Any initial quality of the film that you infer from the size of the audience when I went to see it (I was one of only two people in the cinema, let alone the screen, and the second person was that one I'd gone to see it with) should be thrown away. The lack of an audience can be put down to the facts that the only showing that week was at 10 o'clock in the morning on a Friday, when most kids would be in school, and that as poor students we'd both been waiting to have the money to go, so we were five or six weeks past its release.

Film review- The Adjustment Bureau

One of the benefits of being back at my parents' house is that they like to rent DVDs most weekends. That means that all the films I've seen pass by the cinema and thought "I really ought to see that" are now re-emerging and I'm working through them.

Did I know how many there were? No. Not until I was wandering the aisles of Blockbusters with my dad and started picking up case after case, telling him what each of them was about, pointing at others, assessing whether they've been rumoured to be critically good or not.

The first film rented was The Adjustment Bureau. It stars Matt Damon and Emily Blunt, but I think the person who steals the scenes they're in is from the supporting cast- one Anthony Mackie as Harry Mitchell, a member of the bureau who is disillusioned with their work and helps Damon's character, politician David Norris. It's no small feat to be the stand-out actor in this film, however- both Damon and Blunt offer solid and nuanced performances, Damon in particular, and the supporting cast from which Mackie rises includes the cornerstone actors Terence Stamp and John Slattery as Mitchell's seniors within the bureau. Despite that, he still stands head and shoulders above his colleagues.

It is worth noting that, in watching this with my parents, the concept behind the film is exceptional, brilliantly mind bending and yet easy to follow, as evidenced by the fact that my mum didn't stop once to ask what was going on. As yardsticks of overcomplicated narratives go, Mum is top-notch. If an audience won't get it, mum says so. However, having followed the premise that every single person has a Plan written for them to control their Fate along with the less strong Chance and Free Will (used for minor decisions, such as "your toothpaste, or what beverage to have with lunch"), Mum then stated the film was "creepy and mades you feel funny". In that the ideas behidn the film made her question if such a thing could happen with that sort of thing. Don't worry, it's not going to have that affect on you, it's just a hypersensitivity she alone possesses- me and my dad were fine. It's a cracking premise, though, and as I've said, the performances are more than worthy of carrying it.

Which is why, as is so often the case now, the resolution and the third act really just disappoints. It had so much that went before it to run with and, in a neat and hastily resolved quarter of an hour (if that) threw away any chance of being exceptional and daring with it. Which is ironic, as Mitchell states that the humans who the bureau have diverted away from greatness could have been so much more, were it not for the unquestioning execution of the Plan for each of them. Had the script not been so blindly followed and a more daring, deviating conclusion been thought up it would have been an exceptional film, deserving of the quote the DVD cover and TV adverts are repeating ad nauseum. "Bourne meets Inception" it wasn't, but could have been.

A Summer's Afternoon in a Meadow

A relatively long post today, but hopefully succinct. Choosing To Die finished not quarter of an hour ago on BBC2. Sir Terry Pratchett exploring the nuances of being able to tell when you want to go, weighing it up against guessing when you will no longer be able to do it yourself, trying to be dignified in dying- an outstanding programme, with exceptional people. Peter Smedley and Andrew Colgan were two outstanding gentlemen who knew that it was all they had left, in the time left when they still could, to end it before they were no longer able.

I have always been so assured of my own immortality. I turned 21 not six months ago, and waste some time in quixotic planning of things I may or may not ever do with my life. The one thing I do know is that, as for me death is the end of it and there is nothing on another side or in another world, I would never, ever want to give up.

And the thing is that these men haven't given up.

'Blank Blankerton' has skewered you. Return fire?

Ah, social networking. That dangerous wasteland of procrastination, of studying other people in a manner which would be considered not just an invasion of privacy in real life but also downright sexually delinquent, of an oxymoronic name given the readiness with which the rules of social engagement go out the window.

(Poor pun number 1- on one level, people disregard the social rules; on another, you're viewing the website in a window. Har har.)

I, recently, changed my esteemed and oh-so-nurtured Facebook settings so that the langauge everything is written in is "English- Pirate". Almost a year ago I did much the same thing, which lasted all of about a month before I changed back to regular English, sick of the amount of things I could no longer understand. In the time between both of my forays into social network Privateering it appears I've got my sea legs and sea lingo a little more sorted, and therefore the first instance of anything I didn't understand or deduce the meaning of occured only two and a bit months in. I was informed, among the masses of notifications about messages in bottles, scrawlings on planks and other such peg-legged punnery, that I had been skewered.

This was a triumph.

This post is unique for several (read many, many, many) reasons.
First- I am no longer, technically, an undergraduate student. Huzzah! And poignant goodbye to what has been.
Second, out of almost eighty, this is the first post in which I have succeeded in embedding a video- and that video is, indeed, plenty apt and also "cracking".
Third- it's prose heavy. I'd apologise, but it's meant to be.

Here is, from Portal (Portal 2 was released recently, buy it) the end credits "Still Alive" written by Jonathan Coulton. It sums up these two days, and these three years, and (effectively) these fifteen years of education, in my honest opinion. This has, well and truly, been a triumph.



Today has been, all in all, pretty good. To the point where there is too much to mention should I be trying to record an entire day's activity in a single Facebook status or "tweet". Everything except blogs have word limits.

So the day began with a really early morning start, in typical insomniac and scalding-shower-alertness style at just before eight. A cup of tea followed, along with much recital of quotes I would, it turns out, not need or forget in the exam.

The next stage of the day, or significant stage, was either realising how sunny and nice it was as I left the house before eleven or the reason I was leaving the house at that time- to sit in The Novel Cafe and review notes and themes etc with the esteemed and beautiful Kristina Roberts and Kat Haylock. Both of these women got me through today, no word of a lie.

Having done all that it was time for a brief trip on campus and a brief spell of about half an hour on a triangle of grass in front of the George Fox building (he was a quaker, dontcha know- I was a quakin' for my second and last final). I ate a bacon and egg sarny. It would have been a salami roll, but while I deciphered the text up close with my faulty eyes a hand, belonging to a beautiful red head, swiped the product away. I protested by way of complaint, and haven't stopped going on about it all day, including the "diary entry" post being written now (considered this evening).

Between then and the next notable event in this post some sort of exam happened... Oh, wait, it was my last exam ever. Oh well. I finished it with twenty minutes to spare and decided, after a debate, to walk out early. The reason? I'd never done so, and wanted to feel the "thrill" (that's right, Haylock, mock all you want) of it just once.

The Writers' Society hoodies arrived two days ago, and this evening we got to see and collect them from the resplendent Laura Dallison, Social Secretary. They look awesome.

Then there was the drinking, and the Writers' Society meeting. We held it outside in the brilliant sun. I read a poem, like a girly girl, which was corrected by my peers and encouraged. Ta. Then it was back to the bar.

On returning to the bar, we ran into the stoner crowd again, those who will waste their lives on substances not substance they've been part of and will probably die forty years before us. The good news? Haylock hadn't returned home, and fled them to talk to us. Cracking. After merriment, an evening spent fighting, drinking and making our fathers proud, we returned to town and home, via two places of distinction.

One- the ice-cream shop that has recently opened on campus, with every flavour under the sun including rum and raisin, which I partook in. Then, to wind up the evening, myself and a burgeoning, potential writer in the form of David "The Prospero" Helm ventured towards The Stonewell Tavern, where I had never been. In terms of what's on tap and the music they had in tonight, it's on a par with The Dalton Rooms and The Robert Gillow. And I had a free pint. And they played James Brown's "I Feel Good", which I said I was likely to break out of when in the bar after the exam.

So there we are- a day, after two or three (I'm not sure) days of rough sleep and shit cramming and worry over examinations, in which everything tied up. It all came together, it all ended, and, hey- I'm still alive.

Getting rid of the voice saying 'Don't make me do stuff'

Experience and epiphanies come in all shapes, sizes, places, states of undress, degrees of sobriety, degrees of intoxication and shades of fatigue. They can strike you, with short term frustration, during the first-thing wake-me-up solo fumble under the bed sheets just as equally as they can pause you mid-sip of your fifteenth 'cup o' joe' and just as potently strip away any other thought or factor you were paying attention to.

In this aspect they are like ruthless and inexplicably succesfully efficient toddlers. The other thing they share with the fledgling, wailing, sticky-fingered semi-humans is that once they have your attention whatever they are trying to show you is often incredibly and insufferably annoying, if only because you should have seen the life milestone/ dead amphibian in your kids hand (and, imminently, mouth) a lot sooner.



Such an epiphany hit me recently. Everything I have known

On the replacement of skill with luck in the modern gameshow

Right, prissy and pretentious 'essay title' style heading aside, let's got on with this shall we? You haven't got all day.

Gone are the days when you could win money for knowing things or being good in a field such as retaining knowledge/ intelligently matching answers with answers popular with the public/ intelligently deciphering a clue or puzzle or catchphrase. This sort of actual skill, brain power, concentration and logic has, unfortunately, been sidelined to National Lottery spin off shows, normally on air while people leave the TV alone to have dinner, the gap preempted by Doctor Who and any number of talent shows and closed by Saturday night dramas and the film at nine.



Now you have to rely on, without fail, luck

The curse of a good book

Reader, I apologise for being so abesnt over the last months. I promised myself that I would not, could not allow anything so pithy as a degree and the work I had to undertake thereof to stall my frequent harranguing of the proverbial ears you lend me. Clearly, I was wrong.

However, had I not been so Preometheanly chained to the rock of higher education while my coursework pecked at my internal organs, there is no way in which I would be able now to nejoy the respite with any way near as much gusto. It is this freedom, the liberation to read and write what I like now while merely dabbling in this strange trifle called revision, which bring us our next topic of grumbling.

I have a, at times unfortunate, love of books. Can't help it, that's that, it's the way my mother put my hat on (cheers Rob), etc. And now that I'm free to read what I want, I am- with some brilliant and some more tarnished results.

Cut the head off the snake and find it's a hydra?

Negativity isn't normally what I set out to broadcast to people, honest. Personal pessimism, maybe, but negativity isn't my default setting. I just try to point out the glaring flaws in a lot of peoples' celebrations sometimes, with a touch of what I like to call common sense.

I should note, before I go any further, that I am not talking about, nor will I mention again, the mass hysteria with which 24-hour rolling news would convince us the nation was gripped in the run up to Friday. Most people don't care and were sick of it, so I'm going to leave it well alone.



This morning I awoke, having spent last night sat in a pub which advertised a quiz (there was no quiz), watching the latest episode of The Walking Dead and my perennial favourite Stephen King film Misery and then spending hours writing because I was unable to sleep, in a sort of fuzzy haze. My stereo alarm was blaring at me at the regular time of 6:30 despite being on a volume of 5, and the grey dawn filtering through my skylight was burning into my corneas. It was that sort of stumbling, fumbling wake-up, until I heard a news story which snapped me right into conciousness and alert attentiveness.

Osama Bin Laden (not to be confused with one of the perpetrators of his downfall, President Obama- I'm looking at you, Fox News) has died

The rise of the rhyming advert

Twenty two days without a post? Blimey. Anyone who thought the recent summer glory would have mellowed me, sorry, but I return with a resounding fanfare of two words. Stop it.

Here's a quick list of those involved so far- Jenson Button, Harvester, a 118 radio ad, that stupid dog training TV show after extensive research, it is called A Different Breed- I'm not sure if that's in reference to the dogs, the team behind it or the owners), and Cuprinol's 'Wood Preservation society'. Also, the "For dogs who BLANK a lot" dog foog ad- Oh, Philip Glenister, how could you?

'500,000 on sick are fit to work'

Oh, dear god.

If this is true, as one minister suggests, then every single one of these 500,000 people need to get going. Or move abroad so we don't have to deal with them sitting around and cheating everyone else out of what they could be doing.

I'd like to turn to a recent piece I wrote to be published in my college magazine, The Bowland Lady. If you're ever in the North West of England, seek it out. The piece was entitled

Grit your teeth and get on with it- that ridiculous sense of entitlement in the job market

and I think it's a bit relevent here. It reads as follows:

If I wanted to take part in a scrum I'd have gone to a midnight rugby game.

This is a shout out to all the shitheads out there who love to make queueing at the bar a physical war. I do not want to go to a nightclub to get my upper body workout, or any sort of exercise for that matter, aside from occasional "dancing" which may cause other people on nights out to question both my sanity and whether or not I've got some sort of permanent problem with my nervous system. I want to drink copiously, bellow along to songs which should have been left in the past and generally have a good night.



Having to take part in the ebb and flow of people that becomes a gigantic, braced scrummage with dozens of individual three and four man teams all heading in the same direction and, apparently, attempting to widen the club twenty metres by pushing the bar and back wall away is not my idea of a great way to spend twenty minutes.

And the upshot of it all?

Ink-redible idiocy or deliberately printing money?

A minor gripe inducing piece of stupidity occurred to me today as I was sat, working away like a good little boy on my essay rather than heading outside into the sunshine which has decided to grace us and bake the interior of the library. I was tapping away at the slightly tacky keyboard as you do and decided to print out what I had of my essay so that I could hand write the links required and refine my argument somewhere away from a computer screen. I can't think when I'm staring at one, not a bit. And it was hot. Really hot.

It then occurred to me I might not have enough printer credits to print off all three pages as I needed to.

It's alive! Frankenstein's Wedding- Review

You shouldn't have to force yourself to sit through the first twenty minutes of a show to wait for it to get good, or even get really good and have an emotional pay-off at the end to reward your patience at the start, but with Frankenstein's Wedding if you did stick with it that's exactly what you got. A phenomenal piece of live musical theatre which succeeded in updating the Frankenstein tale, keeping all of its emotional clout and upping the heartstring pulling idea of The Creation all in one evening of entertainment.

An open letter to the people of the country Libraria

Dear all,



I have noticed recently that there has been some confusion over what constitutes being a colossal dickhead in the nation of Libraria and what does not. Allow me to clear a few things up for you, but first may I just say that yes, it is your fault that I have become that guy, and no, I'm not happy about that, either.

The Shit On TV These Days Series overview- Outcasts.

Good lord. Location: South Africa. Budget: More than most BBC drama years. Outcome: Eh...

Okay, I have watched every episode of Outcasts. And it yo-yoed between mediocre and awful. Why? Well, it all got a little out of control to be honest, after what was a frankly painfully slow pair of opening episodes which established the world and the people in it with the speed of a geriatric gastropod and the all the detail of a senile account of an event which happened in the individual's infancy. The main thing to blame for the whole show being a disappointment, really, was the writing.

It's a shame that a nation which has brought Doctor Who and Being Human (at least, before it too became overstuffed with ideas in the third series) to the international table still suffers and can't do decent sci-fi drama justice in the way that the States do. Look at Battlestar Galactica, for Christ's sake, then look at Outcasts again. Not only is their a a lot lifted from the Americans' series, it's been copied and mimicked badly.



And it was a decent premise, really-

“Patience is waiting. Not passively waiting. That is laziness. But to keep going when the going is hard and slow - that is patience.”

Hi. Me again. You know, the bloke who was moaning about not being able to get at money that's sitting around with his name on not two hours ago. I ended that post with the news that I was going down to the tax office to try and " 'ave it aat" with them.

That went well. My request/ obligatory confusingly worded form has been submitted, a polite gesture akin to saying "Hello, excuse me, that money over there with my name on? Yes, that reasonably moderate pile? Well, could I have it?".

The problem is the lady who works there, who was very helpful, informed me that it could take up to three months before I hear anything. Lovely stuff. So once again it's been dangled just above my reach and then hidden in a see-through box.



It's not that I haven't expected to be poor. I'm doing an English Literature and Creative Writing degree, clearly I have to accept that at some point I may end up in a doorway with a bowler hat and the toes of my boots missing. I just didn't expect it to be while I was still studying for that degree. Perhaps I was naive.

Still irritates me though.

"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels, it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." -Terry Pratchett