You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!

The beauty of the simplest language

When asked if it was hard being a writer Oscar Wilde reportedly described the scrivener's plight as such: yesterday I spent the entire day inserting a comma; today I spent the entire day taking it out again. Crafting, chin rubbing, never being satisfied or quite sure. Call it what you will. The need to change things is as strong as the need to write something in the first place, and just as inexplicable. Don't confuse this with the need to change things for the sake of changing them. There are plenty of people who feel compelled to change words just because they can. Usually into something trite or over-grand in the hope that it will make them seem something they are not. If you really have something useful to offer, fill the blank page yourself and change away. Craft it. Rewrite it in half as many words. Then rewrite it using half as many words again.

The Quicktime movie above is an extract of the late Jack MacGowran reading from Samuel Beckett's 'Watt'. You'll either get it or you won't. Not many did when Beckett was trying to get published. I guess some things never change.

You can buy a CD of MacGowran reading Beckett here.

Why don't Amazon accept Book Tokens?

Amazon is convenient. It has a better choice than the local Waterstones. But Amazon doesn't accept Book Tokens. Why? Book Tokens  have a unique serial number. I could enter this number on my Amazon order and the token be logged as spent on a central database at National Book Tokens HQ. If I try to redeem it in Waterstones or the local independent book shop (are there any left?) it would come up as spent when they entered it into the system. Not difficult, is it? So why can't I use my Book Tokens with Amazon?

10 Things to do this Christmas

1. Sing Sesame Street’s ‘One of These Things is Not Like The Others’ to the chorus of Foo Fighters ‘The Pretender’. It’ll be in your head for hours.

2. Eat something you haven’t eaten since primary school.

3. Smile at an old person. Better still, wish them ‘Merry Christmas’. Suicide rates peak amongst the over 65s at this time of year. Sometimes a couple of words make all the difference.

4. If you have kids, enjoy the mince pie and whiskey that your children leave for Santa. You’ve earned them.

5. If you haven’t got kids, leave a mince pie and whiskey for Santa anyway. You never know.

6. Wear the oldest Christmas jumper you’ve got hidden at the back of your wardrobe. Smile when people tell you how nice your new jumper looks. You may even get a compliment from the person who bought it for you all those years ago. Say nothing.

7. Avoid the iTunes Store when you’ve had a drink. It won’t sound as good in the morning.

8. Treat someone special to breakfast in bed. Your own breakfast will taste nicer for doing so.

9. A cocktail = two pints. A cocktail = two pints. Commit it to memory.

10. Live in the moment. Forget what you may or may not have done the past 12 months. Forget what you  want to achieve in the year ahead. Feel the cold air or the warmth of a fire. Notice the face of someone around you, the lines that chroncile their life. Listen to their voice as well as what they say. Savour the smells and tastes that you are experiencing. In an instant this moment will be just a memory. Make sure it’s a good one.

Merry Christmas.

Sorry, Christmas is censored this year.

Radio 1 has just announced that after nearly 20 years of playing The Pogues and Kirsty McColl's famous Christmas hit 'Fairytale in New York' as it was originally recorded, this year it is to be re-edited to be less offensive.

Specifically, this editing concerns McColl's lines "You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot", and McGowan's "You're an old slut on junk". The BBC sees these lyrics as offensive, despite the fact they are parts of dialogue exchanged between two fictional characters in the song, and not simply generic homophobic or 'heroin-addicted-prostituteophobic' abuse.

So where does this stop? Should Bing Crosby be censored for dreaming of a White Christmas...? Surely in multi-cultural Britain we should beseech unto each other the benefits of a multi-ethnic Christmas?

Furthermore, the lyrics of Deck the Halls urge us to "Don we now our gay apparel
Fa-la-la, la-la-la, la-la-la.", and the song 'Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas' instructs us to 'Make the Yuletide Gay'. Do we hear howls of protest from the homosexual community, or even those vehemently homophobic who fear their morals are being undermined? No.

Similarly in "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" we are told "He sees you when you're sleeping". Frightening stuff, but are the anti-pedophile lobby marching on parliament to stop this aged, bearded, voyeuristic man from sneaking into children's bedrooms at night? No they aren't.

Grow up BBC. I'm ashamed, and you should be too. Your role to the public is to Educate, Inform and Entertain, not to advocate censorship. Shane McGowan may be an ugly drunkard with sticky-out-teeth and a body composition of 33% vodka, 33% whiskey and 33% methylated spirit, but he certainly knows how to write a good song - and that song has been good enough for all of us for 2o years. I'm sure McColl is turning in her grave, and McGowan would be too if he was dead - which to be honest is surprising that he's not. And dear God don't try and cremate him, it'd be like Hiroshima.

unusual uses for technology - no.4

Got an MP3 player? Want larger breasts? Combine the two with breast implants that have a built in MP3 player.

It could happen within 15 years according to BT Futurology. Hang on a minute, this story is two years old so they should be available in 13 years.

They don't say where the controls would be:

http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2005/10/mp3-breast-implants.php

unusual uses for technology - no.3

While we're on the subject, the following is from an article in the Metro newspaper a year or so ago. If you don't believe me you can check it out here.

RAF repair plane with teapot
Tuesday, December 5, 2006

A teapot was used by an RAF crew to block a hole in their plane after a mid-air mechanical fault with a hatch door.

The Nimrod plane, which was on an operational flight, had taken off from Cornwall and was on its way back to base in Kinloss, Moray, when the problem occurred.

The crew had been trying to release a sonar buoy into the sea through the hatch when it got stuck and air starting whistling in.

Yesterday, an RAF Kinloss spokeswoman said the crew's safety had not been compromised.

'There was a minor malfunction with the hatch cover and the teapot would have been used to make it more comfortable for the crew,' she said.

Airman Neil Campbell, who was on board, said: 'It had no safety implications and really is a storm in a teapot.'

Boom, boom.

This is, in my opinion, quite possibly the most quintessentially British thing that has happened in this country since about 1945, and it makes me feel a warm glow of patriotism. Just makes you wonder how they managed to survive the rest of the mission without being able to make a brew.