today i wiped my bum on the guardian tv pages. i checked to see if there was anything i wanted to watch. all i spotted was the kevin costner sf movie “the postman”, oh look i will be at the cinema when it is on. bless the dvd recorder technology that i have invested in. record the movie on the tv, go and see the movie at the cinema.
win win.
result.
ah if life was only that simple.
because i was in a rush, and i am never at my best when i am rushed on the bog as i really do like to linger and savour the toilet experience, i didn’t really do much in the way of cogitation. i read a few reviews of sf and fantasy novels from an old issue of deathray (i would have read them sooner but most of the articles in this issue were about battlestar galactica and watchmen – neither of which i had seen at the time. still haven’t seen bsg). a few books added to the ever growing list of books to buy and then i realised i was going to be late for the cinema, seeing 'surveillance' (and very good it was).
the thing about the tv pages is that there is little i really want to watch. i confess that i could easily become addicted to television, but i have been spared it by the fact that there is so little that i really like that is on. not that i am taking a moral high ground here, it is just that a lot of the things that i want to watch are on channels that i just can’t receive. for years i lived without a television and i have lost the habit (skill?) of being able to read the tv guide and remembering to watch the programmes that i want to. most nights i find myself agreeing with springsteen “57 channels and nothing on”. then i catch something and wonder why i bothered, such as the horne and corden show. i kept having to remind myself it was supposed to be funny and wasn’t some belated attempt to subdue the populace.
though all is not lost as one of the greatest programmes in the world is shortly to be back on our screens. yes i am talking about ‘two pints of lager ..” a show that has dispensed with the double entendre and just goes for the smut jugular. i love it for that simplicity of purpose – laughs from rudery. it works so well.
so i know what i will be doing sunday night.
oh and what became of ‘the postman’. i recorded it. somehow i managed to do it with a different audio channel. an audio that basically does a verbal précis of the film’s action, but does it as the film is playing but all dialogue is silenced. because there is a voiceover, it can’t be for the hard of hearing, because it seems to occur throughout the whole movie with periods of silence it can’t be for those with attention deficit i don’t quite know what the point was.
i will have to look out for (the inevitable) repeat of ‘the postman’, but i will keep this odd version for future reference.
the guardian is here
deathray is here
find out about movies such as 'the postman' and 'surveillance' here
two pints of lager is over at the bbc
Thursday 12 March 2009
Thursday 5 March 2009
05/03/09 – spurs
today i wiped my bottom on tottenham hotspur. it was the sport pages of the evening standard. i could have chosen the back page of the evening standard, but as an arsenal (oh so apt) supporter spurs are the chosen enemy.
it was a perfunctory trip to the bog. not been a good day and i was in a bit of a hurry. so i just stuck with a quick flick through the pages of the standard, avoiding the reviews pages as there were reviews of a couple of films i will be seeing shortly and i don’t want them spoilt, i will read the reviews after to see if we are in agreement.
the throne of thought came up with little beyond wondering what i would watch on tv. ‘http://www.tnt.tv/series/thecompany/castcrew/?contentId=31489’ won out, if only because it features michael keaton. oddly i thought this was a new show, guess who was shocked to discover that it has already appeared on bbc1. i really must pay more attention.
details about spurs are here but you are better off checking out arsenal.
the evening standard can be viewed here, try not to read the nick curtis humour pieces - they are not funny.
more on 'the company' can be found at, and you can't watch it again on the bbc's iplayer.
it was a perfunctory trip to the bog. not been a good day and i was in a bit of a hurry. so i just stuck with a quick flick through the pages of the standard, avoiding the reviews pages as there were reviews of a couple of films i will be seeing shortly and i don’t want them spoilt, i will read the reviews after to see if we are in agreement.
the throne of thought came up with little beyond wondering what i would watch on tv. ‘http://www.tnt.tv/series/thecompany/castcrew/?contentId=31489’ won out, if only because it features michael keaton. oddly i thought this was a new show, guess who was shocked to discover that it has already appeared on bbc1. i really must pay more attention.
details about spurs are here but you are better off checking out arsenal.
the evening standard can be viewed here, try not to read the nick curtis humour pieces - they are not funny.
more on 'the company' can be found at, and you can't watch it again on the bbc's iplayer.
Wednesday 4 March 2009
04/03/09 – apple iphone
today i wiped my bum on the apple iphone ad that ran on back page of 'the independent'. i love my apple ibook and if i had the money i upgrade to a top spec mac desktop jobbie not to mention a brand-spanking top of the line laptop; both would be packed with key software. while i am at it can i have a pony? (the pony reference is from the ever funny ‘calvin and hobbes’.)
while doing the do i was reading a recent copy of ‘the wire’, i had bought it because it contained a cover cd. i used to buy it regularly, pretty much just for the reviews. i would read them and make notes on the cds that appealed and then start to see where i could get them. sometimes i would just get them from http://www.roughtrade.com in brick lane. mostly my purchases would be made online from one of three sources: play.com, http://www.othermusic.com/ or amazon. to be honest i am a reluctant user of amazon, i have no rational explanation for this, it just is. other music is based in new york and is a great little store and the few times i have been to new york city i head there and treat myself to a bunch of cds. if they have what you want in stock then their mail order is pretty special. mostly i used play.com.
‘the wire’ magazine appeals to the more adventurous music lover, someone who is prepared to take a chance on a new sound. not all that appears in ‘the wire’ is any good, in fact a lot of it is shite, but the readership is very eclectic so one reader’s shite is another’s gold.
one of the things i like about the reviews in ‘the wire’ is hardly a month goes by without a new release from merzbow or john zorn, currently all that means is that there is another title to go on the ever growing wants list. there was a merzbow review in the issue i was reading. there was also a listing for a new frank zappa release, which is pretty impressive since he is dead, but this is by his estate and includes lots of unreleased material from the ‘grand wazoo’ sessions. it has gone straight to the top of my wants list.
thank you ‘the wire’ for bringing it to my attention.
another thing that happened while using the independent as toiler paper was i had an ‘eureka’ moment. i had been trying to remember the name of an ex-colleague, for a few days it wasn’t there. a few moments on the bog and bang there it was. a quick shout out of the name the whole thing is forgotten again.
then it struck me if i can have ‘eureka moments’, true they are not important in the grand scheme of things but they are for me, imagine what could have happened if archimedes had been blessed with indoor plumbing?
go on just think about it.
next time you sit on the toilet just think about it. you know it make sense.
to view apple products go here
read 'the independent' here
have a look at 'the wire' here
play.com can be found here, while amazon is over here
other music can be found here while rough trade is here
while doing the do i was reading a recent copy of ‘the wire’, i had bought it because it contained a cover cd. i used to buy it regularly, pretty much just for the reviews. i would read them and make notes on the cds that appealed and then start to see where i could get them. sometimes i would just get them from http://www.roughtrade.com in brick lane. mostly my purchases would be made online from one of three sources: play.com, http://www.othermusic.com/ or amazon. to be honest i am a reluctant user of amazon, i have no rational explanation for this, it just is. other music is based in new york and is a great little store and the few times i have been to new york city i head there and treat myself to a bunch of cds. if they have what you want in stock then their mail order is pretty special. mostly i used play.com.
‘the wire’ magazine appeals to the more adventurous music lover, someone who is prepared to take a chance on a new sound. not all that appears in ‘the wire’ is any good, in fact a lot of it is shite, but the readership is very eclectic so one reader’s shite is another’s gold.
one of the things i like about the reviews in ‘the wire’ is hardly a month goes by without a new release from merzbow or john zorn, currently all that means is that there is another title to go on the ever growing wants list. there was a merzbow review in the issue i was reading. there was also a listing for a new frank zappa release, which is pretty impressive since he is dead, but this is by his estate and includes lots of unreleased material from the ‘grand wazoo’ sessions. it has gone straight to the top of my wants list.
thank you ‘the wire’ for bringing it to my attention.
another thing that happened while using the independent as toiler paper was i had an ‘eureka’ moment. i had been trying to remember the name of an ex-colleague, for a few days it wasn’t there. a few moments on the bog and bang there it was. a quick shout out of the name the whole thing is forgotten again.
then it struck me if i can have ‘eureka moments’, true they are not important in the grand scheme of things but they are for me, imagine what could have happened if archimedes had been blessed with indoor plumbing?
go on just think about it.
next time you sit on the toilet just think about it. you know it make sense.
to view apple products go here
read 'the independent' here
have a look at 'the wire' here
play.com can be found here, while amazon is over here
other music can be found here while rough trade is here
03/03/09 - u2
today i wiped my bum on u2. it was the advertisement for their new lp and was the back cover of the sunday times culture magazine. i took great pleasure in the simple action of the wipe. i just don’t like u2. i am sure that bono and the boys have done lots of good in the world but not enough to make up for bono’s smug mug, or their tax avoidance schemes.
strangely before and after i wiped i was reading some articles in an old copy of wired magazine about open source computing, downloading and sampling music.
it was not strange that i was reading on the bog, i do that a lot. in fact i do a large chunk of my reading on the porcelain throne. nor was it strange that i was reading a magazine that was several years out of date, as i seem to have many magazines that are both out of date and unread.
no it was strange because of the u2 connection. as the rock band cleaned my crack the articles about downloading and sampling referenced a band called negativland, the self-proclaimed kings of kut up kulture. years ago negativland did a version of u2’s “i still haven’t found what i’m looking for”. it was very funny. it also resulted in u2 taking negativland to court. bad bono, humourless bono. every cloud has a silver lining and later there was an album with various versions of the naughty song on it, the album is the classic “these guys are from england and who gives a shit”. it is very funny. a little like the first tenacious d album it is hard to explain why it is funny, but each time i play it i laugh.
there was a moment in metallica’s career when they went from being heroes of speed/thrash metal to corporate suits when they were involved in the move against napster and illegal downloading.
it is a hard to respect someone’s championing of the little people when they are busy defending their own bottom line. (though i guess that is easy for me to say as i have no intellectual property to defend.)
the articles on open source and sampling/ downloading pointed to the potential for a new model of business and creation, back when (2004) the articles were written we were all living high off the hog. now in this time of financial crisis there is even more scope, and perhaps, even more need for such new models.
what makes the whole thing worse is that i quite like u2’s new single. the shame of it.
(for those interested in buying u2 cds go to play.com)
(for those interested in buying negativland cds go http://www.negativland.com/)
strangely before and after i wiped i was reading some articles in an old copy of wired magazine about open source computing, downloading and sampling music.
it was not strange that i was reading on the bog, i do that a lot. in fact i do a large chunk of my reading on the porcelain throne. nor was it strange that i was reading a magazine that was several years out of date, as i seem to have many magazines that are both out of date and unread.
no it was strange because of the u2 connection. as the rock band cleaned my crack the articles about downloading and sampling referenced a band called negativland, the self-proclaimed kings of kut up kulture. years ago negativland did a version of u2’s “i still haven’t found what i’m looking for”. it was very funny. it also resulted in u2 taking negativland to court. bad bono, humourless bono. every cloud has a silver lining and later there was an album with various versions of the naughty song on it, the album is the classic “these guys are from england and who gives a shit”. it is very funny. a little like the first tenacious d album it is hard to explain why it is funny, but each time i play it i laugh.
there was a moment in metallica’s career when they went from being heroes of speed/thrash metal to corporate suits when they were involved in the move against napster and illegal downloading.
it is a hard to respect someone’s championing of the little people when they are busy defending their own bottom line. (though i guess that is easy for me to say as i have no intellectual property to defend.)
the articles on open source and sampling/ downloading pointed to the potential for a new model of business and creation, back when (2004) the articles were written we were all living high off the hog. now in this time of financial crisis there is even more scope, and perhaps, even more need for such new models.
what makes the whole thing worse is that i quite like u2’s new single. the shame of it.
(for those interested in buying u2 cds go to play.com)
(for those interested in buying negativland cds go http://www.negativland.com/)
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