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29th May I think I'm going to hate this World Cup. The vulgar, arrogant faux national pride which will be dripping from every car, window and idiot's lips is almost nothing compared to what we will see and hear in the media. It has started already during tonight's friendly with Hungary. Friendly - remember that. This is a match of no consequence what so ever. England were awarded a penalty when Steven Gerard was brought down. They showed a reply and it was absolutely clear that Gerard had in fact dived to win the penalty. He cheated for no reason in a friendly game with nothing on the line. The reply was shown and Motty asked Mark Lawrenson whether it was a legit penalty. "No but forget about that for a moment" said Lawrenson and he waffled on about England missing a chance seconds before. So that's the pattern for the summer - when England cheat we must "forget about that" and concentrate on something else. They didn't score from the penalty but there was no "justice is done" or "perhaps they didn't deserve it" from the announcers - just lots of "unlucky England". Because we're even rubbish when we cheat. In a friendly. Which doesn't matter at all. I'm also going to hate it because my exile to the Dark Side has - surprise surprise, shock of shocks - been extended because the Lords of the Sith are even worse at predicting numbers than they thought they were. Another three weeks of crushing boredom and misery. And I've had to cross aspirin off my list of possibles because it has too low a success rate. A measly 2%. That's rubbish.
29th May I really enjoyed last night's UFC show. Results vs predictions follows after this brief spoiler space. A two minute Photoshop job which so incensed the "apes defecating on a pitch" poster of earlier in the month that he was tipped over the edge and launched a rather comical verbal attack on a bunch of people and got himself banned.
If you're wondering, it's Clive Dunn eating a Cadburys Flake in a suggestive way. It made sense at the time. ... I thought the show was great - well worth staying up late for despite being up early yesterday morning to go and give the once over to the Oracle upgrade at work. Matt Hughes Vs. Royce Gracie Me - Hughes TheArtist - Gracie Result -
Hughes Brandon Vera Vs. Assuerio Silva Me - Vera TheArtist - Vera Result - Vera
Mike Swick Vs. Joe Riggs Me - Swick TheArtist - Riggs Result - Swick
Diego Sanchez Vs. John Alessio Me - Sanchez TheArtist - Alessio Result - Sanchez
Alessio Sakara Vs. Dean Lister Me - Sakara TheArtist - Lister Result - Lister
Jeremy Horn Vs. Chael Sonnen Me - Horn TheArtist - Sonnen Result - Horn
Spencer Fisher Vs. Matt Wiman Me - Fisher TheArtist - Fisher Result - Fisher
So by my reckoning that makes six out of seven for me and only three for m'colleague. My honour is restored, my back-to-back humiliation postponed until August at the earliest. Had I not massively underestimated the ground skills of debutant Dean Lister I could've scored a perfect seven. The show is well worth catching a reply of - only one fight goes the distance and that has such a wonderfully weird last three minutes that even if you hate long fights which go to a decision you'll be entertained by this one.
28th May You have to love Ian Levine. Under the heading "Worried About The Competition" he expressed a heartfelt "I do hope the wretched celebrity football doesn't pull viewers away from Doctor Who." Having been taken to task for wishing failure upon a charitable event like Soccer Aid he went on to say -
I really felt he was going to lie awake all night worrying about this. Luckily he was able to post the following during the night to let us know he hadn't slit his wrists.
You can see his point though - a one-off celebrity charity event which could mean a couple of million people have to watch one of the BBC 3 repeats or (at worst) skip a filler episode might mean that the show is cancelled at the end of next season. Never mind that it has been the BBC's biggest hit in years, has recreated the concept of family viewing, is selling merchandise by the tonne, is being shown around the world, is at or near the top of the (non-soap) ratings every week, has won dozens of prestigious awards, has turned BBC Wales from a regional broadcaster to a production hub and has destroyed everything ITV can throw at it. One ratings blip and the whole thing is over. Thank Christ there is no more football this summer or we'll all be doomed. Fuck. Actually, the overnights are in and the football did dent the ratings but Doctor Who still won and that alone is considered a victory. The rating was down a couple of million but nothing like Ian's apocalyptic scenario. So tonight he can rest easily. Sidebar, I was struck while listening to The Stones of Venice that Duke Orcino reminds me of Ian Levine. There is something about his brand of obsessive madness which makes me think of Britain's foremost expert on what Ian Levine did in the 1970s for which we should all be grateful. I would dearly like to re-edit Orcino's speeches to create an Ian Levine podcast but alas the overlaid music makes it impossible. Which is a shame as three minutes of rambling about "My beloved... Doctor... Who" would've been richly comic. I found this online - see if you can guess what it is.
The answer, dear readers, is the original Bungle the Bear from Rainbow. Apparently, the Rainbow we all know and love - Geoffrey, Bungle, Zippy and George - was simply the most successful incarnation. Before all that there were other people, other puppets and the above costume which looks less like a loveable, cuddly friend and more like the sort of monster that would feature prominently in the dreams of one terrified of hypnotists, dirty old men and mutant foxes. Come face to face with that and you would run a mile. And, lest you think I use this journal only to point out the personality flaws of others, a reminder that I am not as other people. I was fighting with my little nephew - something that I'm rather good at and which never fails to keep us both amused - when he attempted to get behind me. I'm not keen on that because once he's on my back there is very little I can do to make sure he doesn't hurt himself. Anyhoo, I managed to wrest him off without injury and the next time he tried I grabbed him round the waist and pinned him to the ground. "First rule of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu" I began, "never give up your back". Because obviously that is something you say to a five year old. Bless him - he saw X Men III yesterday and apparently someone in it used the word "dickhead". Its become his new favourite word. Something I found far more amusing than his parents.
27th May The Idiot's Lantern was another great episode. David and Billie are so good at doing "fun" stuff and this was designed to be a fun episode. Ok, they added a superfluous domestic abuse angle which wasn't really necessary and at times threatened to burst the fantasy bubble but mostly it was fun. The problem with doing something down to earth and serious like the Connolly's home life is that you're cutting between that and a story where a monster who looks like Maureen Lipman is trying to suck Britain's brains out via their television sets. I suppose they were trying to do something different with the "seeing it through the eyes of an ordinary family" trick but it was (in my opinion) a mistake. They could've achieved the same effect with a simple "traditionalist" husband, weak wife and plucky rebellious son without giving it a nasty subtext that Mr Connolly was going to beat the crap out of his wife as soon as the front door closed. But that's a minor nit pick for an enjoyable action romp. Some people are going to say it paid homage to Sapphire and Steel Adventure Four, others that it blatantly ripped off S&S and shout be shot. I was disappointed that Confidential didn't even touch on the faceless effect. There's another thing - for the first time EVER I actually watched Confidential. I have no idea why - I was needing the loo before the episode started so why I stuck around for an extra half hour I don't know - but I did. It was good. I think I'd always felt that spending 45 minutes being drawn into a story only to spend the next 30 minutes having every last ounce of tele-magic wiped away by the cold hand of reality was a bit silly. I was amazed that Mark Gatiss managed to sport a bald head, a full head of hair and an occasional beard during the half hour, all while narrating the episode and never letting his narration slip out of the third person. I wanted to know about the facial effect. There were times when it looked like a dodgy blurring effect (the sort you'd see on COPS if you were prone to watching that sort of thing) and others where it appeared to be makeup. The only hint Confidential gave was a shot of granny with crosses all over her face. Which suggests it was added afterwards. Not that there is any reason why what happened to the peeps should've erased their faces but left everything else in tact, or why the Wire's death should give them their noses back. But this is New Doctor Who and no one dies unless they are the baddie or they are in a parallel world which is, by definition, wrong. I wish they'd left Mark Gatiss's line in about the Doctor being nervous climbing the transmitter because "I once fell off one". That would've been great. Elsewhere, it has been one of those days which passed in a groggy but resentful stupor. Of the eight and a half hours I was awake I can account for very little. I finished series 1 of Are You Being Served? (which is fantastic), listened to the first two parts of The Settling (which is shaping up nicely) and watched the Shamrock-Ortiz fight from UFC 40 (which was a few weeks early as Shamrock-Ortiz II isn't until early July and, on the evidence of their 2002 fight, will be a squash for Tito). Speaking of the UFC, I saw the odds for this weekend's show and was moved to find out exactly what the hell America odds actually mean. You'll see Hughes -300 and wonder what on earth that is supposed to be. Well now I know and it makes a sort of sense I suppose. If you care, it goes like this. In order to win $100 betting on the favourite (Hughes, as denoted by the - ) you need to stake $300. So if you bet $300 on Hughes to win you will get $100 plus your $300 when he wins. If on the other hand you bet on Gracie it works a little differently. Because he's the underdog (with the + sign by his odds) you will get $250 if you bet $100 on him to win. So with the favourite you know how much to bet to win $100 and with the underdog you know how much you'll win if you stake $100. That has baffled me for ages and I'm glad I now know it isn't just a load of made up nonsense designed to confuse me. Like Welsh.
26th May It's that time again. With UFC60 taking place this weekend it is time to, in the words of Yes Minister, nail ones trousers to the mast and make some predictions. Since the idea of getting TheArtist to choose winners worked so well last time (if my abject defeat and humiliation can be said to be working well) I've done the same again. We disagreed about five of the seven fights which should ensure a definite outcome.
Matt Hughes Vs. Royce Gracie TheArtist says... Roy will gracefully pound Hughes' head in
TheArtist says... Vera to finish in the gold medal position in this contest. Silva in, well, in Silver (lame).
Mike Swick Vs. Joe Riggs TheArtist says... Swick not so slick, he'll have rigor mortis after this. [Riggs]
Diego Sanchez Vs. John Alessio TheArtist says... It will be pronounced die-go after this bout. John Alessio to inflct the second case of death during the evening.
Alessio Sakara Vs. Dean Lister TheArtist says... A Dean Lister win, I could give you a lista reasons why. Just can't be bothered.
Jeremy Horn Vs. Chael Sonnen TheArtist says... Sonnen to blow his own trumpet in this one, he'll win easily.
Spencer Fisher Vs. Matt Wiman TheArtist says... The Fisherman to win, leaving Matt muttering "why man?" through his mashed up face.
F4W is trying to spread the word about "My Name Is (El Guapo)", a song which mixes Eminem's hit single with the words of Bas Rutten. It's worth a listen and a giggle. Click here for the MP3.
24th May I'd be a lot happier right now if I knew that this time next week I'd be free of the Dark Side. But since I'm not, I can't be. If there was a definite end in sight then I could count down to it, I could mark the days off in a calendar or set up a spreadsheet to calculate it to the nearest second. But I can't do any of that because I have absolutely no idea what will happen. The Dark Side is like a child who cried when he had to do his homework. A kind parent stepped in and, just this once, helped the little chap by doing it for him. The next week he got more homework and cried again. The same kindly parent helped out again by doing it for him, just this once. Week after week the parent does the homework for him because he knows that if he cries his problem is solved. That's what the Dark Side does. Their problems are chronic, endemic and will never be resolved. They have neither the will nor the ability to sort things out because they have become used to shedding a few calculating tears and someone will rush along and do it for them. Although when they do try and change things they invariably make everything worse. Witness - The staff incentive programme which was named "Rainbow" (an optical illusion which doesn't exist and can never be reached) that set impossible targets and required staff to spend an awful lot of time doing pointless things which in turn made it even more impossible to meet their targets. Morale is far lower as a result. The mainframe replacement project which took an antiquated piece of expensive junk and replaced it with something modern. Sadly, it is a java emulator which is unresponsive and unreliable. It will shut itself down if you open a URL in an email because Outlook hijacks the browser window which is required to be open in order for the emulator to exist. Those are just two examples of what is wrong. I've been asked to put a report together when I get back to offer a low-level outsider's view on how things could be improved. That's our department's role after all. No one will take any notice of it of course - my voice won't be heard over the sounds of another crying fit. And I'll be forever branded someone who "knows our systems" and so can help out the next time they get any homework. You know something is wrong when it is the happiest members of your staff who are the ones who are looking for other jobs. The miserable ones have had the life so utterly sucked out of them that they can't even be bothered to help themselves. If you get weekly slaggings off from your boss about how you aren't "productive" enough, even though you do ten times more than she does and have clocked in ten hours overtime during that week, it is no wonder you begin to believe you don't deserve anything better. We're told the Dark Side is the future of the group. If they are our future then we don't have a future. Speaking of the future, congrats to ShirtGuy and Mrs ShirtGuy on their happy news. Come November there will be a little one to wrap in a nylon-polyester mix blanket and to puke all over his collection of exotic football shirts.
21st May I don't think I'll ever understand father. Not that it is always easy to (literally) understand him - he talks with his mouth full whenever physically possible and it isn't that long since I heard him answer the phone with a mouth full of sandwich and conduct an entire conversation with a cold caller through a solid mass of bread and ham. He was telling me today that he had been looking at LCD televisions. A good idea thought I. Specifically, a 20" one he saw in the store formerly known as Dixons. I was confused - he currently has a 28" TV and would in no way be able to manage with eight fewer inches. That would go against everything we know about human evolution. Then he continued by asking me when ntl: were going to start HD TV. I was at a loss. The chances of getting any noticeable benefits from a 20" HD TV are remote. Not to mention the chances of getting HD TV from ntl: also being remote. Which made me think more about the forthcoming high definition revolution. I am doubtful that it will be what it is made out to be. Remember back in the olden days when digital television was the new thing and we were promised DVD quality pictures and CD sound? That didn't happen. The platforms got greedy and bitrates were lowered until there were three hundred channels which looked ok until someone moved. Your broadcast channel has just over 600 lines of resolution, a DVD has around 400 and which looks better? The latter by a mile because it is given the space to provide a high quality picture. Had HD followed analogue it would've been in a better position. An analogue channel occupies about as much space as a HD channel. But you can fit around ten digital channels in the same space as one analogue channel. So Sky and the cable companies were able to replace 40 channels with 400 and so now there are 400 channels. Unless there is a massive increase in broadcast capacity there simply won't be room for more than a few HD channels unless hundreds of current channels are removed. So what will happen? The HD channels will end up being lower quality than they could be and another promise is broken. And anyway, ntl: keep promising things they don't deliver. Proper interactive services? Not yet. TV On Demand? Not yet. A three-tuner PVR to kick the spots off Sky+? Not yet. One day they will actually do something. Something that will begin to consider the possibility of potentially examining ways of maybe using the opportunities which they could have to hypothetically produce some kind of service which might put them in some sort of possible position to maybe consider finding an avenue by which they may be able to mount some kind of challenge to Sky. But, sadly, ntl's idea of innovation is finding ways to charge more than Sky for a product which is several years behind Sky's and takes longer to install. The Ian Levine forum continues to be an interesting read. After two days of complete freedom the admin has decided that moderation is required. Some people are now complaining about the supposed hypocrisy of a "free speech" forum deleting posts and threads. This is why I hate the internet - knuckle dragging morons who are unable to tell the difference between "free speech" as a concept and the ability to troll their way around a message board calling Ian Levine / Eric Saward / JNT / A.N.Other a cunt. It never occurs to them to behave on message boards as they would in real life. Although, sadly, it becomes ever more apparent that real life is degenerating to the level of online life rather than online behaviour improving to the level of the real world.
20th May II Tonight's Doctor Who was so much better than last week's. Or maybe it wasn't - maybe I was the different one. Distracted by new glasses and a new television I might've been better able to just enjoy it rather than focus on the flaws. I'm glad they acknowledged that this wasn't "proper" cyber-history. I was very pleased to see a subtle Five Doctors joke. I was happy to see Mickey go out on a high rather than just continuing to be the character they use whenever they need a scared/useless/screaming/confused/stupid companion. Rose isn't allowed to be any of those things or it would be "sexist" so they used Mickey (and Adam for a couple of weeks) to get around the problem. Now he gets to liberate Paris... in a van. Marvellous. And I think my telly kicks ass. I didn't really want it but I was offered it for nothing and took it. I've never really been bothered about 16:9 before. I'd get one at some point. But I remember the Christmas Invasion - seeing it on father's TV and then watching it again (sans children) in 4:3 at home - and how people have started framing shows for widescreen. It used to be that shots were lined up 4:3 and the extra width was a pointless bonus. Now heads and faces and things are chopped off and, unless this is revolutionary France, that ain't right. I doubt I'll notice any difference next time I pop in my Sensorites video but for the modern stuff it is an enormous boon. And we're always on the lookout for enormous boons. One other thing, I was watching The Ultimate Fighter last night and Ken Shamrock's team lost again. He bemoaned the fact that they were now 1-5 in the series. "I've never been down 5-1 in my life" he said with a faintly insane grin on his face. I've just checked Sherdog.com and if we exclude a minor show against a no-name opponent in 2001, Shamrock's recent record against credible opponents is... 1-5. That made me laugh that did. The plan for this weekend is to do two small updates. The reason being that P-Bal's Eurovision rundown needed to go up today and the post-Age of Steel feedback will come along tomorrow. There might even be some more haikus if the muses are kind to me.
20th May I got my new glasses this morning. Since I've never had a pair that I haven't disliked I wasn't expecting much. The vision is a little clearer and the reacting thing does work (though I only realised they had changed when I looked in my rear-view mirror and they were tinted). They are also lighter than the last pair so feel flimsy and rather fake. The reality is that, like everything these days, they are made in a hurry with technology replacing care and they are probably as good as they could be under the circs. And they cost less than two hundred quid. The last lot were £250, very heavy, uncomfortable to wear and I doubt I was ever able to see far enough to pass a driving test. Basically, my eyes suck at seeing things and I suck at trying to solve that problem. If I was brave enough to let a strange fire laser beams into my eyes I'd go for laser treatment. But I'm not so I'll have to soldier on with badly made furniture on my face. Ian Levine's new forum has got off to a surreal start. Having been forced to leave OG, Mr Levine has now gone off on his own and established a message board where he can be "uncensored". Posts have fallen into three camps so far - those that are illiterate and abusive (either to Ian or to Ian's enemies on other forums), those that are sycophantic to Levine and those that are blatantly taking the piss out of him. He seems happy enough and I'm sure it will settle down after a while. For now it will be an interesting place to visit. If only certain other people would do likewise and shut themselves off in their own little forums, never to emerge and piss me off ever again. Speaking of people being cloced off from reality, Big Brother has started again. I saw a bit on Digital Spy about how Tourette's groups are protesting at a Tourette's sufferer being included.
This strikes me as a bit absurd. Surely this man has made his own decision and has the right to go on Big Brother if he wants to. Why should he be prevented from doing what he chooses simply because he suffers from a condition? Ok, I know Channel 4 and the Big Brother producers are cunts who will happily exploit anyone and anything in their quest for ratings and deliberately chose this man so he could be exploited and humiliated but he should know this too. We've had seven Big Brothers (plus countless celebrity spinoffs and similar productions) and anyone who doesn't know that they are being exploited is an idiot. The audience they cater for likes everything to be really simple. This guy is the retard who can't stop swearing. That's it - he will be that and nothing more. Anyone who does anything which doesn't fit in with their stereotype will find themselves edited in such a way as to either play up to their stereotype or play into a breakdown storyline. So don't blame the lion which attacks someone that climbs into its cage and starts kicking it. Blame the guy who climbed into the cage. He at least made a choice.
18th May We had an "influencing skills" workshop today. It was an interesting course and touched on some areas that are interesting me at the moment. And it was nice to spend the day with my real team and away from the Dark Side (though the training room we were in was within spitting distance of TDS). We started out with a general discussion about the team/department (for it is one and the same) and the head of the dept - CityFan - did express his concern at us being seen as a resource bank for under-performing areas to borrow staff like so many library books. He said he was keen to change that perception and not fall into the trap that many have fallen into before. Which I agree with whole heartedly as history shows that no good deed of this kind ever goes unpunished in the long run. An odd moment in the day was when one of our number was talking about peer pressure and the goth movement that swept round her school. Suddenly everyone was dressing the same way and acting the same way and it was hard to explain why. Now, I misheard her (she is from North Britain and has the accent of her native Edinburgh) and thought she said golf movement. I had a strange image of hundreds of teenage girls walking round in plus fours and Pringle sweaters. I've been (slowly) reading an introduction to neuro-linguistic programming and amidst the high level ideas and technical jiggery (not to mention pockery) was one concept which immediately made sense - that of RAS (reticular activation system). It is the process by which the billions of pieces of sensory information which we are exposed to all the time are filtered before they reach the conscious mind. The example they give is that a parent looking for their child in a shopping mall crowd can magically see the specific person they are worried about amidst hundreds or thousands of other people. The reason this struck a chord is that it explains why, when I spot a number plate that I need, it seems to stand out so much more than any others. It almost glows with an ethereal whiteness. As if Jesus decided to pop back to earth as a plastic rectangle nailed on to the front of a car. Ah, perhaps I should avoid words like "nailed" around him. At least I now know that there is a reason this happens and that it is science rather than sorcery, Miss Hawthorne. Today's e-bargain is season 5 of the Simpsons from Amazon Jersey for a mere £9.99 (inc P&P). Cheap at half the price* *an expression which staggeringly DOES make sense as it originally went "cheap at half the price of the big stores" and was the cry of market sellers who set up in the road outside the department stores.
16th May I heard someone say the following today.
But I also had an encounter which may explain why I was sent to the Dark Side. If you believe that things happen for a reason - and I'm not sure either way - this is why it has all happened. I was standing at a printer, basking in the fact that it has been fixed in just less than a week, when someone I used to see from time to time at The Old Place said hi. He mentioned that someone had been asking after me. I asked how he was. He said not well. I got his mobile number and have actually sent a text message. I've never sent one before - I've replied to a few but never started from scratch. It took ages and I'm never going to like the tortuous process but it said "hi" and gave him my email address so maybe he'll get in touch. There were exactly three things that were fun about The Old Place (not counting the Tesco Metro across the road which shortened my life by selling me donuts whenever I wanted them). He was one of them. The other two being the better looking members of staff and the writing of most of the early website pieces during those final weeks before closure. So there is a chance that some good may come of this situation after all. It's nice when the chemical tide lets me see the positive in things.
14th May With all the hype surrounding the final episode of "The West Wing" I find myself wanting to buy the huge "Bartlett Years" boxed set. I used to love the West Wing. It was great stuff. If memory serves, the first season was on Channel 4 and was immediately followed by the second season on the fledgling E4. Even though E4 was the most inept channel since MTV used to find a different way each week to fuck up Daria (I remember them showing one episode with the previous week's audio, showing the second half of the episode first and coming back from commercials and showing the first half, we once had two different audio tracks playing at the same time and more wackiness besides), it was still a weekly highlight. Then came the six or seven months between seasons. This dented my keenness. When it returned in double bills - two episodes back to back - it was the killer blow. I'd watch the first one, tape the second and try to catch up before the next week's two hour block. It didn't work. Like putting Buffy and Angel back to back, the second hour was too much. I think I stopped fairly soon and merely recorded it every week, intending at some point to resume. It didn't happen. I feel now that I'm missing out on something special. With the season boxed sets refusing to drop below £28 each the big set looks tempting. I probably shouldn't, even with recent overtime, but who knows? I might. I'm off now to possibly pick up a television. My brother has bought himself a plasma telly and wants to offload his old one. I've never bothered to go widescreen as groovy LCD tvs will find their natural price point within a year or so and most of the stuff I watch is 4:3 anyway. But a free widescreen telly is a free widescreen telly and while it will probably ruin my bad shoulder forever and do terrible things to the rest of my untrained physique it is something to do. I might even like it. But only sometimes. Over the past couple of days I seem to have started cycling up and down several times an hour. That can't be normal. Several times a week possibly, even several times a day but several times an hour? Not great.
13th May Tonight's episode showed what is fundamentally wrong with the new production team's vision for the series. Everything has to be anchored firmly in the present day. Everything must be instantly identifiable with real, tangible, current stuff. All that stuff about a parallel universe was there because they wanted to do Genesis of the Cybermen but without telling the forty year old story. Cybermen, as established in 1966, developed on Mondas. But Mondas is an alien world. That's no good - how will a modern audience be able to understand an alien world? It's all... well... alien. That would require imagination and we can't have that. So we'll send them to a parallel reality and do it there. That way we can have the birth of the Cybermen but set it in familiar old London with Jackie and Rose's dad and Big Ben and mobile phones. Your modern audience can understand parallel realities - they did them a couple of times in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. We have Cybermen spouting the home computing speak of 2006. The one thing that struck me as not fitting this model of familiarity was a black president. Surely they'd use either a smarmy Blairish guy or a foolish Bushy type. Then it struck me - the president in 24 is probably more well known than either Bush or Blair and he is indeed a black man. An inside reference to International Electromatics and a payoff to Eccleston's "Ricky" thing doesn't change the fact that they are dumbing the series down by anchoring it so slavishly in the present day. What is the point of exciting adventures in time and space if it all revolves around today? It was a criticism of the old series that Britain was too often the focus of events. Now is it not just Britain, not just the twenty first century, not just this year but it is one family in one council estate in one year in one century in one country. Because the target audience is the real life Jackie and Rose Tyler. And, if I can be appallingly condescending for a moment, Rose's five year old child. Today was also the FA Cup Final. A good game but with a vile ending. Gary Lineker said "it took 124 years for the final to be decided on penalties and now two come along at once". Yes - because it was only last year that some shitwit decided to end the game on penalties. What was wrong with the replay? What is so terrible about a fixture ending with a result rather than a fluke-based pastiche of football? I'm sure both sets of fans would rather see a second game than have neither team truly win anything. Yes, one team gets a trophy but in the cheapest and least impressive way possible. If all you care about is an entry in Rothmans (which probably isn't Rothmans anymore) then win it on penalties. If you care about actually winning a football match then put pressure to bear and get the replay reinstated. The FA Cup is irredeemably cheapened by its loss regardless of how good the 90 minutes are. Still, it prompted some high comedy online with one person posting about the decision to delay Doctor Who...
Over the top, yes. Faintly insane, yes. Abusing poetic licence, yes. But not one hundredth as annoying as everything Nathan says and does. More grumpy old men and fewer twats. That will be my manifesto if ever I run for president of cyberspace.
12th May I was in WHS today and saw two books sitting next to each other on a shelf. Rarely have two images sought to be so different and yet turned out so similar. One is a deliberately gaudy transvestite who parodies female looks and the other is beauty queen who is supposed to represent the ideal woman.
Knowing which is which isn't as easy as it should be. I was walking through Manchester when I saw a woman with a sign round her neck. It said "Am I gay?" She was walking up to people and talking to them, all the while being filmed by a colleague. I'm sure it was some terribly clever piece of performance art / dissertation research / social experimentation / crash TV but I can't help but think she would've been better off simply looking round at the swathe of half naked people around her on this warmest of days and simply working out which lot made her loins twitch. Her point was probably that people make snap judgements about sexuality based entirely on how people look and what they're wearing. That is undoubtedly true, especially if you chose to wear a large sign round your neck saying "Am I gay?" Bloody students. I mean, where is the fun in playing "spot the lesbian" if people walk around with signs round their necks? I've got to do something while in pedestrianised areas because I can't CNPS. And someone handed me a flier for a piercing and tattoo parlour. I don't know whether to feel pleased that anyone might think me capable of a radical, alternative, exciting lifestyle decision or offended that people might think me a weirdo. Speaking of lost causes, I see the latest Big Finish anthology includes a tale penned by none other than Glen "Timelash" McCoy. I've never been entirely convinced he exists. If you'd written Timelash you would use a pseudonym too. The pointless continuity references point the finger at Mr Levine. Who also popped up in the Longleat video I watched this afternoon. He was hosting a charity auction where David "J" Howe paid over a hundred and thirty 1980s pounds for a Fomasi costume. Feet and padding were extra.
11th May It's not too difficult to put things aside for a day and not worry about them. It is only change which lasts longer than a day which has so far eluded me over these past twenty nine and more than a half years. Today has been a fairly productive day, though that will need to be qualified by your definition of "productive". I had my first eye test in three years, chose new frames in under half an hour and didn't get talked into too many "extras". They'll take a while to prepare as I'm quite laughably short sighted and special tools are obviously required. Or they must be prepared in darkness as the thickness of the glass could magnify even the faintest ray of light into a death ray that could do unto an optical sculptor what the Death Star did to Alderaan. I then found my way to the Trafford Centre - using a previously untried route - and three things struck me. Firstly, the van which very nearly struck me and I will admit it was not the most blameless I've ever been. Secondly, it was 40mph all the way along the motorway thanks to the road works which look never to be ending. Thirdly, I got there and immediately wondered what the hell I was doing there. I had no reason to be there, no real interest in being there and there was nothing I wanted which was likely to be there. But - and here is the thing that made it not a problem - it didn't immediately cause an anxiety attack. I wandered round, took in the sights, bought a book about neuro-linguistic programming and came home. At which time I pretty much collapsed. I don't know if its the change in weather, some fascinating medical anomaly or a side-effect of not having slept properly for the last week. I finished "The Kingmaker" in the bath - liking it more than Si did - and spent what was left of the afternoon watching Derren Brown and wanting to go to sleep. I think if I could be anyone in the world I would choose to be Derren Brown. As ridiculously talented a man as you'll ever find on stage or screen. Even if I do have more hair than him. If I dare to give myself a single crumb of hope it is that I get the impression that the two people seconded away from the team I'm currently assisting are very keen to return and that the seat I am both metaphorically and literally occupying won't be available for too long. Maybe, just maybe, next time the pieces move around the board I'll be free to go back to being a productive geek. But I won't feel that confident tomorrow - that is the rule.
10th May I think I've pretty much figured out why my current situation is a bad one. It's because I need to constantly distract myself or the Big Bad takes over. That's why I have so many wretchedly miserable evenings, weekends and holidays - because I constantly make the mistake of letting a little boredom creep in and that in turn lets the Big Bad take over. That's also why this current situation sucks - because I get very bored very quickly doing mundane and repetitive things. This just opens me up for a SDE (severe depressive episode). Depression is far more like a conventional disease than most people think. It multiplies itself, it attacks the immune system and it leaves the victim unable to fight it. It takes away the very tool with which it could be suppressed. It robs you of hope, of sanity, of perspective and of joy. Once it takes hold it makes you hopeless in the moment, despair for the future and fear all those around you. I cannot fight it. There is no point ever fighting it. No one can help. That's how it happens. But fuck that - I'm off for four days and I'm not going to let it hang over me. Tomorrow I'm going to sort out some less rubbish glasses, post some DVDs to m'love and try not to get lost on the way to the Trafford Centre. On Friday I'm going into town for the first time in six long months and I might bob in to see the doctor. The more I read about the flaws in the whole SSRI, SNRI and other antidepressants theory the less I want to take any. I found this at Wiki which describes exactly what happened to me when I cycled off Venlafaxine. It lasted three months and was the reason why I can drop into conversation the phrase "when my doctor checked me for signs of a brain tumour..." But taking pills is a sort of validation. It follows the logic that doing something is better than doing nothing, even if the something never achieves anything. Or makes it worse. Maybe I won't go to see him after all.
9th May So I've now spent two days in the Dark Side. {edited} If you want to know how utterly unsuited I am to this environment take this example to heart. Someone was going through some incoming mail and stopped at a form they had received. I recognised said document. "I wrote that" I said. "Really?" came the bored reply. "Yes - I wrote that by hand in HTML." "Right". The bit I left unsaid was "and I enjoyed it too. Far more than I ever will enjoy sitting here and doing this." And it is true. I took an old, printed form, made it legally compliant, streamlined it so one would suffice instead of six, and wrote it all by hand in HTML. I am a geek. Undiluted and mentally ill. But it has its uses given the right environment. Right now I am a dodecahedral peg in a round hole.
7th May There was a lot about "The Girl in the Fireplace" which was superb. It looked good (both the past and the future), the clockwork robots were a nice idea and well executed, the underlying logic was unusual but sound, David Tennant was fantastic, the woman (I believe his real life girlf) was good, Rose was having a good-arse day and there were some genuinely funny bits. Indeed, the only bit I didn't like was the execution of the "time windows". Firstly, why were there so many time windows? Wouldn't it have been a better use of energy to close those which didn't lead to her at the correct age? Secondly, why was the amount of elapsed time random between uses of the windows? Why couldn't the story either have had linear time on each side of multiple windows or random time on the receiving end of one time window? Thirdly, the ridiculous idea of the fireplace spinning round to let people through. I know they couldn't have people going through a fireplace - this is 2006 and children are too high on Sunny Delight to know not to try and crawl through fire. So why have a fireplace? Why not only allow passage through mirrors (or any reflective surface as used in "Time of the Daleks") when they had been activated from the spaceship? It just seemed rather silly to have an entire revolving fireplace (which could move location). I also liked how it contrasted with what was said in School Reunion. There the Doctor said he couldn't stay with a person and watch them grow old and die. Now he is prepared to do just that with the French bird whose name I can't be bothered to look up. Could this be the beginning of the arc leading to Rose's departure? When she realises that everything he said to her, everything he said to Sarah Jane, wasn't true. And I was pleased they gave a sensible explanation as to why the French bird whose name I can't be bothered to look up was so important. Moffat swerved us nicely when he had the Doctor say we'd probably never know. So an episode with much to recommend it and if you consider that the details were mere dressing and the point of the story was the relationship then the weaknesses in these details don't seem to matter as much. Today has seen me arrange an eye test - my first for three years and a chance to fix a couple of problems - (a) that I can't see terribly well anymore and (b) I've had these glasses for three years and I've never liked them. This time I won't be taken by surprise at the "what frames would you like?" stage. I'm going to know what I want before I go and I'm going to get it. Including those lenses which go dark in sunlight because they are so much less bother than getting and carrying prescription sunglasses. Today has also proven how much fun it is possible to have with one plastic ball, a five year old who has limitless energy and no coordination and a grown up. The grown up being me (in theory) and I'm going to try and live up to that billing. Starting with the removal of recent self-pitying, paranoid, ridiculous drivel. What's done is done and what's not yet happened has not yet happened. Forgetting that immutable law (unless one has a revolving fireplace that is) causes an awful lot of bother.
6th May So I'm fine apart from having felt physically sick for three days, not having slept properly since Tuesday and been gripped by ever expanding paranoid conspiracy theories. Thanks for asking. {edited} I could go elsewhere for help according to Digital Spy -
Google has proved no use at all - however you word it you always end up with anti-suicide websites rather than any practical advice.
4th May I'm still fucked. {edited}
3rd May I'm fucked. {edited}
2nd May About a year ago I started what I thought would be a long, boring and almost certainly frustrating job. Namely, to find, copy, edit, arrange and burn my vast archive of "Doctor..." episodes. Nothing to do with a two hearted Gallifreyan with exes across time and space. I mean Doctor in the House, Doctor at Large and so on. My first problem is that there are so damned many of them. I had a quick count from my master list just now and there are about 150 of them. The second problem is that I wasn't the one recording them originally. I was off in the realms of academe and left such things to mother and father. They don't have an obsessive compulsive disorder when it comes to archiving valuable telehistorical material. Or, to be slightly less Brentian, taping stuff off the telly. So there were episodes all over the place. The third problem was that I underestimated just how utterly, soul sappingly, mind scrapingly boring it was to sit and edit dozens of episodes at a time. I'm a frame-by-frame editor and cannot abide even a twenty-fifth of a second which shouldn't be there. Which all goes to explain why most of "Doctor on the Go" had been sitting on my DVDR hard drive since the middle of August last year. Spurred on by some unknown force I finally got to grips with it on Sunday and over the course of yesterday, finally burned the series to disc. Only one to go - the mammoth 29 week series of Doctor at Large. Which was rather an anti-climax as I left one tape running yesterday afternoon, another over night and one while at work today (plus a handful of waifs and strays this evening) and the last disc is burning now. My sum total is 147 out of the 150 episodes. Two of the missing three are on "Professionals vol 9" according to an old file I found some months ago. The final episode - "Doctors Lib" from the first series of Doctor in Charge - is both missing from the records and I have no memory of it. Which suggests it slipped through the net. Still, it isn't bad going and, twelve years after recording began, I can close a little chapter. It is a great series overall but, sadly, after all this time, one I don't really have any massive desire to ever watch again. Which begs questions of its own but you're too wise to ask them. You will (or may have) noticed some banners on this page, the updates and the home page. Someone who is both cleverer than me and supplied most of the bloopers for the "Discontinuity Guide" has set up a banner exchange programme thingumy. So click on any that take your fancy and hopefully people will do likewise on other sites. Spread the love and, in the words of Bryan and Vinny, PODER~!
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