An Angst To Grind

This World Cup has been ruined. Not by England’s lame exit from the competition, or goal that wasn’t given, but by the circus that now surrounds sport’s biggest event.

Look back to World Cups of yesteryear and it was so much more about the football. And therein lay the beauty of it. Check out those old tv reels on YouTube and they are a thing of footballing joy. Simple, under-stated commentary – message to Tyldesley and co, ‘less is more’ – and great games. The football sold itself. There was a purity about the game back then that has been taken away.

There was no over-the-top hype back then, no endless product endorsement. Now we have ads starring Peter Crouch flogging Pringles, Dizzee Rascal and James Corden singing an abomination of a World Cup song, and games interspersed by stories about so and so footballer about to be signed by so and so Premiership team. This is abject commerciality that has come to define the modern World Cup and in the process sully it.

That pre-World Cup UNICEF game really took the biscuit. Ben Shepherd, Olly Murs, and some c*nt from Westlife whose name I don’t even know, all jumping on the World Cup bandwagon. Sorry, but the entire exercise was far more about re-enforcing their celebrity ‘brands’ than selfless charity to help poor, starving kids.

As for the coverage, memo to BBC Head Of Sport: cut out the overtly PC behaviour such as having Adebayor as a pundit purely because he is a black African footballer who fits the photofit. He has been less coherent than the vuvuzela. This is typical, patronising, middle class BBC thinking, ‘I know. Let’s get Adebayor, Seedorf and any other coloureds, sorry blacks, to show how we are embracing an African-hosted World Cup.’

And stop treating the World Cup as some kind of socio-political tour. The BBC World Cup bus. What is the point of that? We do not want to watch some Home Counties BBC reporter, invariably called Jake with a shirt collar tucked neatly under his sweater, keeping it real by visiting townships and Robben Island. This is not Blue Peter yet the BBC persists in addressing viewers like we are all about 8 years old.

The cliche-ridden platitudes of Lineker, Hansen and Shearer know no bounds. Hansen is like a stuck record droning on about two banks of four and irritatingly starting every sentence he utters with a gutteral, ‘Ermmmmm…’.

The BBC pundits are much like the England football players. Vastly over-paid, over-rated and consistently under-performing at this World Cup. The hyping of the England team prior to the Germany game was embarrassing, cock-eyed and more wide of the mark than an Emile Heskey shot on goal. The likes of Alan Shearer continue to propagate the myth that the England team are full of world beaters because they apparently play like world class footballers week in, week out in the Premiership… where they are surrounded by foreign players, Alan, who make them look better than they are, capiche?

Bizarrely, every world player is rated according to how he played in the Premiership – the ultimate barometer for the modern footballer if you are to believe the pundits. I think all this tells us is that your average BBC/ITV pundit only ever watches Premiership football so it is his one and only, parochial reference point.

The condescension shown towards less high profile competing nations, meanwhile, has been mind-boggling, the likes of Japan and Paraguay portrayed as plucky underdogs when the truth is they play the game just as well as England, if not better. The pundits are also incredibly lazy, clearly not having researched any of the World Cup qualifiers over the previous two and a half years, bar a swift crib off wikipedia. And what is this ’round of the last 16′ nonsense?

When Danny Baker came into the BBC studio and hit them all with some genuine insight they couldn’t cope. You could see Shearer’s face turn to panic, “Can’t compute, can’t compute. Can you just say, ‘It’s went in’ so I feel more at home.” They eulogise over Brazil, purring over every touch they make even if it is just a simple back pass to the keeper.

Clive Tydlesley, meanwhile, treats every game as a chance to inform viewers with his encyclopaedic knowledge of the game. The bloke is so in love with his own voice it is nauseating. He continues to over accenuate the words ‘Chabi Alonso’ to show off the correct pronunciation he has researched. He used to do the same when Veron was turning out for Man Utd, always referring to him as Juan ‘Seba’ Veron. Any football fan worth his salt knows all this stuff already, Clive, so please stop subjecting us to 90 minutes of your tedious, egomaniacal yapping.

The commentators also kept spelling out what a goal meant in a group game as if we had all just landed from Mars, and did not understand the basics of qualification, goal difference, and the vagaries of the draw.

Essentially, they are letting genuine football fans down. This is the populist, dot-to-dot approach to football coverage. Witness that over-exposed lump of play dough James Corden giving us his witty take on proceedings via his ITV post-match showbiz get together. Ah yes, just what i need after seeing England dumped out of the World Cup, a bunch of exposure-seeking celebs giving me their pointless ten penneth.

Ruined… absolutely ruined.

Listen British press. I have had enough and I’ll tell you for why. I’m a journalist but you bring shame on my profession. Why? Because you peddle outrage and have turned modern news output into a cheap, emotive soap opera, all for the sake of your own newspaper-selling agenda.

My fellow hack loves to take up this holier-than-thou position of, ‘Oh, here we go. Blame the media’ like they are above reproach in performing some supreme civic duty. Well, you are not above reproach and increasingly rarely do you act in the public interest.

Yes, you’ve got your expenses scandal to cling to, I’ll concede that. But let’s look at the evidence for the prosecution. We have recently had the Daily Mail doing its best to ruin England’s 2018 World Cup bid. We have had the sleazy tales of the bed-hopping antics of assorted England footballers. And now it’s Rooney’s temperament under the spotlight. Ridiculously overblown and not remotely in his interest, England’s or the public’s. This is about the press’s interest, as it always is. Let’s hammer that point home, once and for all.

But let’s rewind to the recent general election for the most damning evidence. As soon as Clegg shone in the first live tv debate the right wing press attempted to paint him as a Nazi sympathizer. This was a scandalous attempt to sway public opinion.

And then on the eve of the big vote, the right wing media mafia were at it again trying to manipulate voters via hysteria by coming out with all these outrageous, unfounded claims about the dangers of a hung parliament. There would be rioting like Greece. The City would go into meltdown. The stock market would crash. Hail and brimstone would hurtle from the sky. Dogs and cats would start co-habiting. Basically, it would be worse than judgement day. It would be 9/11 times a thousand.

Why do they do this? Because they know that to at least some small degree their insidious messages will seep in. This sort of scaremongering serves in the interests not of readers but of wealthy media shareholders. They’re not interested in fairness and objectivity. They operate deviously through misinformation, striving to keep a tight rein on the consciousness of their docile readers.

Newspaper stalwarts typically refute this by saying, ‘Don’t treat the readers as fools. They are not sheep.’ Yet their editorial slant transparently reveals how they consistently aim to exert a form of mind control.

Another thing that irks is the way in which the press behaves likes the ultimate party-pooper. Announcing the winners of awards before we have the chance to watch them. Giving away the finale of long-running series. That latter one really gets my goat. The bastards going out of their way to try and ruin a series I’ve invested so much time in just for the sake of their precious scoop. In the lead up to the last episode of Lost, I had to exile myself from the media for fear of having it ruined for me.

England are about start their World Cup campaign and what have we had in the lead up? No end of damaging stories about Terry doing the dirty on Bridge, Ashley betraying the angelic Cheryl, while rumours abound of a Gerrard expose being withheld through various injunctions.

We could all live happily, as we did before, not knowing any of these sordid details. Think back to the World Cups of 82, 86 and 90 – did we know anything about the players’ wives? Did we know anything about what the players got up to outside of playing football? No. Yet now the media peddles all this tittle-tattle because it knows it will help fuel newspaper sales, having constructed this entire wretched celeb culture back story in the first place, which now sees vacuous WAGs receive enormous coverage and James Cordon sing horribly nationalistic World Cup songs we are cajoled into liking. Well done the media. Give yourselves a pat on the back for the vile beast you have created.

You have this bloke at the News Of The World lulling various celebs into showing they are flawed individuals, and then the press acts as the ultimate moral arbiter roundly slaughtering said individual, generating anger and hatred among readers.

There was that tale of the foolish, ignorant mother who left her baby on the beach in the sun. She rapidly became a figure of hate. Radio phone-ins cranked up the fury by getting listeners to give their views. What sort of society is this? This is the equivalent of putting people in the stocks and throwing rotten cabbages at them.

After the press have blown up stories out of all proportion, hacks then have the temerity to come on radio or tv and say how preposterous it was that the issue was over-blown. Hang on a minute. You were the ones over-blowing it in the first place.

Buy a tabloid today and it has no relevance to genuine world news. It’s an extended soap opera of so and so celeb’s dieting/drinking/drugs hell, and assorted Z-list fodder getting over break ups. They hang around showbiz events trying to photograph Jordan’s knicker-less under-carriage. What kind of sick, voyeuristic world have you fuckers created?

And even a more serious subject such as sport has now been sullied by the press. It’s not just all this World Cup sleaze. Just look at FiveLive, a respected sporting news outlet, which now creates most of its output from the leading questions it asks sporting interviewees.

Five Live reporter: ‘Rafa, were you concerned, after your injury last year, that you would never get back to your best?’
Rafa, ‘Yes, for sure, it was a concern.’

The FiveLive sporting news bulletin headline that follows: ‘Rafael Nadal says he was fearful he would never return to the top of the game…’

This is beyond futile. This is creating news for news’ sake. For all of its newsworthiness, they may as well run instead with, ‘Alan Shearer has confirmed he will be putting a second coating of Cuprinol on his garden fence this weekend.’

If you listen to Gary Richardson on a Sunday morning on FiveLive, he loves to act like the grand inquisitor when all he is doing is striving for that headline-grabbing soundbite by asking leading questions.

‘So is that a denial that LFC will be spending this summer. I can say that? I can write on the door I am the assistant manager?’
The Office reference there. Remember? Gareth?

It’s time to gag the likes of Richardson and the media in general. I recommend following my stance and not buying a national newspaper any more. And switch off the radio and mute the tv while you’re at it. It’s the only way forward. It’s a stance against all this cheap and vulgar output. I mean, really, what is the point when we are hounded by so much propaganda, hype, moral posturing and unnecessary, irrelevant, sordid, wholly unpleasant celeb-based tripe.

The only place to find beauty, and honesty, and integrity any more? Music…

It’s the eve of the general election and I am already seething at the prospect of David Cameron getting into power. It’s a given that the Tories are only interested in looking after the rich which is why they have so many safe seats in the affluent Home Counties constituencies. All the commuter belts where rich mums pick up their kids from public school in Land Rovers, and dads peruse their stock market portfolio. Where young Toby and Sebastian are groomed for a cushy job in the City, courtesy of dad’s connections, maintaining the Masonic handshake clique.
The Tories are the PR arm for big business and the wealthy elite. Their central ethos is about self-interest. Always has been, always will be. Cameron wouldn’t be seen dead in a council estate post-election, unless there’s a good photo opportunity in it.
There was Simon Cowell on the front page of today’s Sun backing Cameron, giving us his vision for the future of the UK. This is a multi-millionaire who claims he knows what’s best for the country. He claims in this story to be in touch with real people having toured the country over many years with his shows. Fuck off Simon. Everyone knows you are only helicoptered in for those acts that make the best tv segments; whom you mock or big up according to your own ratings-driven, revenue-generating agenda.
The way The Sun wheels out Cowell on the eve of the GE and sells this total b.s. to its readers is scary. This is propaganda in action. This is the right wing press cranked up to full throttle to persuade those individuals who have the inability to think for themselves to back the Tories.
I’ve stated in previous posts how Cowell wields more power than politicians in this country. This is the Tories trying to leverage that power, selling their message to working class individuals for the most part who will be set adrift at the bottom of the food chain under the Tories, while Cowell has a thousand accountants ensuring he pays fuck all in tax, and lives virtually in exile in his Hollywood mansion while being invited round to dinner at No10.
There’s Cowell in this article saying, ‘I always trust my gut instinct’. And, by association, Sun readers are being asked to trust Cowell. The same man who plays those Sun readers as schmucks when they tune in to his grotesque prime time talent contests.
‘I have always hated celebrities lecturing people on politics’. And he proceeds to tell Sun readers who to vote for. You couldn’t make it up. This is a national disgrace. This is beyond transparent. This the most-read newspaper in the UK trying to behave like a totalitarian state.
If the country has any sense it will not be taken in by this charlatan. They will see through the Tory spin and see Cameron for the odious, snake oil salesman he is. Cameron is a Tim Nice But Dim character who makes out he’s green cycling his bicycle in front of a phalanx of cars. He’s a Tory boy through and through which means he’ll look after the interests of the old school tie network, and prop up all those elitist, class-ridden snobs who look down their noses at the proles and love to talk about benefit scroungers, and widen the gulf in our have and have not society.
About the only clear policy of Cameron’s that came through during the live tv debates was his desire to raise the inheritance tax threshold. It’s a protect the rich message because only those individuals who have high earning City jobs or who have been able to borrow a massive amount of money from mummy and daddy are able to afford those properties worth the sort of sums that Cameron is looking to protect. On the serious, society-wide issues he was wishy washy as hell. He actually ended up making up some policies on the spot to make himself look better. That’s how threadbare the Tory manifesto is.
Cameron is a vacuous windbag and his party are feckless. The entire raison d’etre of the Tory party is to keep wealth and power in the hands of a few, while blaming the Europeans, immigrants, political correctness, whoever – and thus protecting and advancing often fascist sensibilities – for all the ills of the world. The Tories are the handbrake on real progress in this country and always will be. Why everyone cannot see this I do not know. Or perhaps they can but couldn’t care less about the rest of society and just want to look after number one. Sad if so. Very sad. I’m still hoping the wisdom of the anti-Tory majority will prevail. If not, will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights.

My pioneering stance as a misanthropic social commentator is, like all clever ideas, being copied to death.

We had Grumpy Old Men and, by the way, that arrived long after my jaded, curmudgeonly views were being fervently spouted. Then it was Grumpy Old Women and now, guess what? Yes, they have expanded the franchise further, so we now have Grouchy Young Men. What next, Grumpy Adolescents, Grumpy Toddlers, Grumpy Left Wing Hermaphrodites Living In Primrose Hill?

It’s easy to be a misanthropist in 2010 when the very fabric of society is set up to torture the soul. Piers Morgan interviewing all his showbiz chums really got under my skin recently. It irritated me so much I refused to watch. So much for ignoring those things that annoy; merely being aware of this show’s existence was enough to still leave me seething.

Using the platform of his Britain’s Got Talent notoriety to interview his fellow panel flotsam, in the process building them all up as the new glitterati elite. Morgan is that much of a media behemoth he gets to chat breezily with the PM, subtly attempting to persuade the masses to vote for Brown in the upcoming general election.

‘Oh yeah, he really came across well. He seemed so much more human.’

Why are the public such sheep? It troubles me deeply, it really does, especially around general election time. The politicians play us all for schmucks. The modern political game has nothing to do with policies or manifestos; it’s a PR contest pure and simple. Telling us what they think we want to hear to persuade us to put our ‘x’ in their box.

I thought I’d seen it all until Labour wheeled out Tony Blair to tell us not to trust Cameron because his entire campaign is based on spin. The audacity of the man. Blair was the fucker who turned spin into the de facto method of modern government.

Bill Hicks must be turning in his grave. He called it 15 years ago – the way politicians manipulate the docile masses. And here’s the thing that really drives me nuts. Why does the upcoming general election have to be seen as an either/or contest when both choices are so glaringly shit?

People are so complacent, unimaginative and set in their ways in this country. ‘Voting lib-dem is a wasted vote,’ they moan. Only because c*nts like you keep reinforcing the status quo.

Tory heartlands and Labour strongholds are full of those who refuse to shift in their allegiance buying their Torygraphs and left wing Mirrors and Guardians. No wonder so many are apathetic when there is a sense your vote won’t change a thing. We should have proportional representation but that is far too democratic for this twat-ish nation.

If the lead up to the general election isn’t dispiriting enough, there’s always Saturday night primetime TV to sculpt a perma-frown on my face. I can’t even bring myself to list what appeared on ITV last Saturday between 6.30 and 10pm because it was all such spirit-crushing, insipid fare.

A question: as a celeb is it now a pre-requisite to get your name in the title of your show for the sake of self-promotion? Harry Hill’s…, Ant & Dec’s…, Pier Morgan’s…. Building brand equity, you see. The be all and end all of modern celebrity and politics.

I’ll tell you another thing that is really irking me. That loud and loathsome Pavarotti lookey-likey screaming, ‘Yes you’ll thank your stars that you went to GoCompare.’ These sort of ads are created on the basis we all have shit for brains. Actually, people with shit for brains would be over-qualified to watch this kind of cretinous sales pitch.

I knew it was time for me to escape the house, get away from the hard sell, but within seconds of leaving the front door, the peace and quiet was shattered by a boy-racer in his pimped up wheels whizzing down the road with JLS’s ‘One Shot’ blaring out so loudly his sub-woofers were distorting. ‘One Shot, just give me one shot…’ Yeah, with a crossbow aimed at your head.

R&B suits this dumbed down country so well. Let’s all listen to JLS, watch ‘What Katie Did Next’ on ITV2, stare at cellulite snaps of celebs in Heat, and go and get our teeth laser-whitened.

But no, I will not be dragged down by the fatuous, shallow pond life I observe all around me because the sun is shining and spring is a time to feel chipper and upbeat.

Yet every day, without fail, something happens to persuade me this country has gone to the dogs:

I reach the newsagent only to be encountered by a massive long queue and all I want to do is pay for my paper. ‘I’ll have five Lucky Dips, two Lottos and three Instant Wins…’ f.f.s..

I pass a gang of feral youths skulking menacingly on a street corner, gobbing, cussing and generally being lairy. Broken Britain in action, shortly before they break my fence for the hundredth time later this summer and I am held in a call centre queue when I ring the police.

I catch the train and some imbecile’s phone starts playing the Hawaii-Five-O theme tune.

And so to finish this tale of modern woe. I took a trip to one of those Cannons-type fitness centres. Looking good, working out, feeling good. Hey, this is more like it. This is nourishing and life-affirming. But, no, it couldn’t last, could it, because no sooner have I entered the sauna than some middle-aged bloke comes in takes his towel off and shows me his knob.

If this isn’t traumatic enough, I enter the changing room to discover another guy strolling around in flip flops chewing gum open mouthed. Yep, bollock naked if you hadn’t have guessed.

‘Get up to much this weekend?’ The staple of office questions up and down the land come Monday morning.

‘Great thanks. I suffered the anti-social behaviour of youths, was left cursing people who enter the National Lottery, was incensed by the crass stupidity of TV advertisers, sickened by Tory and Labour MPs trying to brainwash me, and several blokes showed me their cocks at Cannons. You?’

Of course, I don’t work in an office. I’ll never surrender to the regime, but that’s what they’d ask and that’s what I’d have to reply.

I hope one day in the future my words are unearthed and following the downward trajectory of mankind they will dust off these ancient scriptures and see me as some kind of Nostradamus. ‘Look. Read this. Rob was right. He totally called it. Why didn’t those in power take note?’

Maybe that is what I am here for. That is my role. But for now I am a lost soul not so much living in a fishbowl as a vast spiritual void.

Makes you think you’re better off barricading yourself in, lying in a darkened room singing chirpily along to Morrissey lyrics, ‘Come Armageddon, come Armageddon, come…’

I think I’ll save that for next weekend and in the meantime try to stick to the only beauty I know:

Something seriously unsettling occurred to me recently. The realisation I need to be railing against the world to discover any kind of joy in life. Don’t get me wrong, there are other things that perk me up – Carlos Tevez describing Gary Neville as ‘a boot licker, an idiot and a creep’ for one – but the very act of venting has become my raison d’etre. Without it I am but a dried up rusk of a man.
One of my few satisfactions in life is pointing out what’s wrong with the world as this blog testifies. Given that I find mainstream tv so ire-inducing I could easily switch off if I wanted to avoid all this stuff that grates, but I don’t. I continue to watch and fuel my contempt.
I suppose it’s one way to live, and let’s be honest, we are all just passing the time the best way we know how. In 2010 our best is wretched. Take a long, hard look at modern society and you draw to the conclusion that popular culture has become a vast menu of pointlessness, from inane, celeb-based reality tv shows to weekly soaps. I’m not immune. I watch Neighbours ffs. It has no validity, apart from being part of an established routine. For all the initiative it instills in me I may as well spend the same half hour staring at the wall.
This helps explain why the UK has succumbed to a state of brain-numbed surrender. We are encouraged to sit on the sofa and submit to this onslaught of vacuous popcorn. It’s in big business and the government’s interest to keep it that way. They don’t want us to be enlightened. They don’t want our collective minds opened up by the works of Sartre, as happens in France by the way where philosophy is part of the national curriculum. No, they want us dumb and docile, so they can control and hence profit.
Really, it’s no different from despot regimes that get a bad rap when run by leaders like Pol Pot. It’s dressed up as something that we should be grateful for. It’s said to be civilised and democratic. The free world. They claim we’ve never had it so good and are the ultimate consumer gladiators, when in truth they want us chained and bound as the intellectual holocaust of this country continues unabated.
Look at the way we now spend our time. On Twitter and Facebook. Playing on our Wiis, and PS3s and iPhones, and BlackBerrys and iPods. We’re encouraged to partake of all these methods of wiling away the hours, but what are they actually adding to our lives? Pull out a book, yes, a paperback book, and other passengers on the train look on at you aghast. ‘That’s hardcore man. Old school. Actually reading? From pages? Wow! How do you do it? Can you teach me?’
Reading has gone out of fashion so much people buy audio books instead so someone else does the reading for them. How much more lazy, automaton-like and complacent can we get? First it was luggage on wheels, now it’s being read to. What next, a gadget to bring the food to your mouth without requiring the chore of holding a knife and fork? Or maybe an automated hand, tissue pre-clasped, ready to wipe your arse. Think I better patent that before someone gets there before me.
No wonder there’s an obesity epidemic. People refuse to get off the settee any more, unless it’s to wander over to the computer, to order their next batch of hell food from Tesco’s. We’ve created all these communication and entertainment options that are turning us into zombies. We are becoming so isolationist, it probably won’t be long before the streets are completely deserted, bar the vans of the service providers bringing us all we need so we can continue stewing in our stuporous juices.
Anyone recall the Jerry Springer episode when they got a wrecking ball to smash through the wall of a fat bloke’s house, as he couldn’t fit through the door any more? Give it another 10 years and that’ll be happening daily up and down the land.
Conversation is dying a death and you can see this merely observing the next generation. Over Christmas I watched on as a teenage niece of mine sat staring at her iPod, or her iPhone, or some hybrid of the pair – it’s tough to keep up – with living room chat going on all around her. She didn’t say a word. She was totally disinterested and disenfranchised. To be honest, I couldn’t blame her. The conversation was dull as shit especially when I was holding court.
Talking is passé. Kids today are so switched on and gadget focused that words have become obsolete. There was a great scene in Two And A Half Men I saw recently with the teenage son, Jake, texting his girlfriend sat beside him on the sofa, who let out a chuckle before texting him back which made him chuckle. Other than that they remained silent. It struck me that this is the future.
lol, pmsl, iirc, lmao, fwiw, brb, ffs. You see, no actual words required. It is the language of the mindless, which is the default setting in 2010, also seen in the shortening of couples names like Brangelina and Jedward. You need to be proficient in smiley faces and abbreviations if you want to keep with the in-crowd, and require an urban dictionary to work out what the hell anyone’s saying.
Which brings me neatly on to the main bugbear of this month’s moan. This appalling Americanised way of speaking that has become so prevalent: ‘Give it up’, ‘You go girlfriend’, ‘Talk to the hand’, ‘Kick him to the curb’, ‘loving your work’, ‘you smashed it’, ‘whassup dog’. ‘bustin moves’, ‘booty’, ‘crib’, ‘pimping my ride’, ‘urban licks’, ‘hos’, ‘bitches’ wtf!!!????
The media hipsters have embraced this ‘street’ speak so it is seen as cool, as is the attitude that comes with it. Just look at Lady Sovereign and how she has created her niche as this chav overlord who is loved because she is apparently ‘keeping it real’. It doesn’t matter that she is an ill-mannered, disrespectful brat because she is ‘real’.
Cameron talks about Britain’s ‘broken society’. He’s a twat but he’s right. I’d call it the ghetto-ification of the UK. We took a wrong turn around the mid to late 90s and it’s been downhill ever since. So much so we’ve now created a whole new way not just of talking but of existing, and for the most part it revels in cheapness, vulgarity and staggering stupidity.
And it’s hard not to get sucked into the vortex. Only the other day I got stuck in one of those permanent YouTube Loops – you know the sort. You’re sent a link and next thing you know you’ve been watching assorted clips for the best part of three hours, and walk away from the experience with your brain feeling like dog food.
Still, it could be worse. Looking on the plus side I managed to get past officially the most depressing day of the year unscathed again, despite stumbling across JLS singing their latest single. And right now I feel strangely detoxified, and uplifted, having got all this off my chest. You see, letting off steam has its merits. It’s the only way to cope. Well, that and Radiohead music.

‘So this is Christmas. And what have you done.’ Or perhaps more pertinently as 2009 draws to a close, what the hell are we doing?
These are strange times. I can waste hour upon hour spouting crap and getting into spats on forum sites alone, with invisible strangers. It’s bizarre.
People are so disconnected they prefer to live virtually now through their Facebook page and their ‘tweets’. Some even have avatars. It seems we only discover a sense of community on the Internet, sharing in the mundane details of our lives, and discussing Jedward.
I watched the latest series of X Factor mostly in a state of disbelief at the period of time we are living through. Cowell’s ability to hold the nation in thrall with this hollow, manipulated charade is one of the most amazing magic tricks I’ve seen since David Copperfield made an aeroplane disappear.
We get our kicks these days watching bland, wannabe singers told whether they cut it or not by a panel of marketing men and manufactured pop stars, and z-listers building their profile by eating critters. Strange times indeed.
Personally, I think Ant & Dec should be the ones hauled into court, not just for crimes against Australian fauna but, much like Cowell, for subjecting us to such a crass and tasteless spectacle and profiting massively from it.
Ant & Dec have the further temerity to currently star in Nintendo Wii ads, trousering a cool million each for these mind-bogglingly cretinous segments. In one, the homogenised pair of Georgie fakers pay a ‘spontaneous’ visit to WeightWatchers and speak to ‘real’ women about how the WiiFit Plus transformed their lives.
‘It’s gentle exercise. I’m not into the jumping up and down.’
Nor exercise of any sort judging by the Sumo proportions of your thighs.
‘Do you use the Wii to keep track of your BMI?’ asks Ant, or it could be Dec (still don’t know which is which; still don’t wish to find out).
That’s body mass index – I know this because I just looked it up on the Internet. Yes, that’s right, thanks to the wonders of the WiiFit you too can be as svelte as Jessica Ennis.
Standing in your living room, simulating keeping a hoola hoop going. I ask you. Here’s an idea if you want to get fit – why not go and buy an actual hoola hoop? It’s far cheaper and you might find it works ten times better.
And note the message that appears in small letters at the bottom of the screen: ‘To be used as part of a calorie controlled diet’.
In another ad, they try and convince us the Wii has taken over from karaoke as the cool, must-do activity at your local pub, and it’s the height of fun to feverishly flap your arm through thin air like a stroke victim trying to toss off a herd of sheep. There’s an actual table tennis table over in the corner, guys, if anyone fancies a game…anyone? No, you’re happier to keep tossing off those imaginary sheep.
It’s not just Ant & Dec. The lead up to Christmas is a bun fight among celebs to see who can flog the public the biggest load of tat.
Danny Baker Presents The Glorious Return Of Own Goals & Gaffes. Ah yes, the perfect stocking filler, just as your sides were starting to heal after the first incarnation of this ‘hilarious’ compilation.
Come Christmas Day Baker, along with self-styled ‘hardman’ Danny Dyer (Football Foul Ups), will be responsible for some of the most feigned smiles in the history of present opening. And they couldn’t give two hoots as the royalties come flooding in.
On to comedy, and the DVD guaranteed to sell the most this Christmas. Michael McIntyre. The shires love McIntyre because he is one of their own. He’s as twee and middle class as they come, and about as funny as genocide. This grating little prick reminds me of Colin Hunt in The Fast Show; the sort of obnoxious dinner party guest you’d like to tear limb from limb having sat through an endless stream of his unfunny anecdotes. Not that I’d ever be seen dead at a dinner party for fear of bumping into McIntyre types.
Now, what to buy the family petrol-head…? Of course. ‘Clarkson – Duel’. I can think of a far better title for this offering. ‘Clarkson – Cock’.
And what about a fitness tape to help wifey get up off her lazy backside. Davina Fit – perfect. Some great air-brushing on the front cover gives Davina the glistening abs of an Olympic athlete. Yet more deception.
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to pretend I’m overjoyed as, say, John McCririck’s ‘Racing Out Of Control’ lands on my lap.
‘Oh thanks. Just what I wanted. This will be brilliant,’ I say with unintentional sarcasm, finding it impossible to conceal my monotone despair.
And the only thing these DVDs end up doing is collecting dust on a mantelpiece somewhere, which, a few months later, you pass and think, ‘I really should get round to putting those on eBay.’
We are plagued to death by modern celebrity so what do we do by way of response? Buy all their DVDs, and books, and watch their insipid TV shows, and continue to feather their five-star nests.
If there was ever a time to persuade us we are living in a God-less void, it is now. I’ve never read the Bible but maybe the time has come. Someone once told me the Bible is proof we are descended from aliens. And he wasn’t mentally ill, or taking the piss.
Here’s a thought. Cowell has set his sights on politics next and if the Maya calendar doom-mongers are correct it’s all going to come to an end in December 2012. I can see it now. Just after persuading the British public that it would be a good idea to nuke all those countries that don’t broadcast any of his franchised shows, Cowell will reveal himself to be our Alien Master, before a beam of light transports him back to the mother ship.
Life, ultimately, is about filling in time the best ways we can think of. Given the way we fill in our time now, frankly, we may as well be six feet under already.
And on that uplifting note – happy bloody Christmas.

‘Every passing minute is another chance to turn it all around.’
A great quote that, taken from the movie ‘Vanilla Sky’, a movie panned by critics but very much liked by me, as is my wont. I like it so much I have put it on my office wall.
That’s not actually true. I planned to put it up on the wall, as an inspirational mantra, but haven’t got round to it yet. I’ve not felt inspired enough. I surround myself with clutter instead in a life that struggles to maintain control.
Basically, I’m still unable to turn it all around and my inability to put this great quote on my wall is a tell-tale sign of this. Isn’t that the way of things as you get older? You’d like to change but can’t help falling back on the tried and tested. It’s so annoying. I’d like to change, I really would, but I am unable to. The reason being I am stuck in a comfort zone of my own making. It’s been 40-plus years in the making, carved out and refined by me.
I’ve often thought a great premise to a book would be attempting to re-invent yourself. Is it possible, at age 41, to be transformed into someone completely different? I’m not talking plastic surgery and false ‘changes’ but genuine internal re-configuration. Different hard-wiring inside your mind so rather than being, say, an introverted, work-shy slacker, you’re suddenly confident, charismatic, rubbing shoulders with the showbiz glitterati, and so successful with women even Russell Brand is asking you for pointers.
Let’s face it. It’s not going to happen. I’m stuck with me. The spotlight-shunning me. The bleak me. The shag-wit me. The under-achieving me. The tired before the day has begun me. It’s part of the cruel psychological landscape of being post-40. Waking up and finding the same person looking out on the world and thinking, ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake. Not again.’
Everything that has happened previously is there, all stored up, encouraging me to go through the same old Groundhog slog. Which I do, on sufferance. There’s no newness, only sameness, yet I obediently trudge on.
Let’s calculate this properly. It’s been… oh my God, over 15,000 days I’ve spent on this planet in the same skin, man and boy. No wonder it’s become so insipid and wearisome.
Wouldn’t it be great to have a day off from yourself? Escape your mind and body and look at the world through someone else’s eyes? Find out what it’s like to be someone else. My first choice would have to be Sandra Bullock. I would love to enter her. Just for a day. That’s all. It’s not asking much. She is so bright, and charming, and beautiful.
Admittedly, when I say I’d like to enter her, I’m looking at it from the perspective of not actually being her but being me, and wanting the chance to… I’m sure you get the picture.
Or how about becoming a whole different species? Take to the sky as an eagle, or swim the ocean as a dolphin. Knowing my luck I’d get stuck in a net.
I’m really rooting for those Buddhists to be onto something. To come back as someone else, or something else would be so amazing. But it seems a long shot, doesn’t it? I lost my dog Louis this year and when it rains this little slug keeps sliding into the house under the back door. I look at it and wonder if it’s him, come back to see me. It’s heart-breaking and highlights the flaw in the whole reincarnation thing – the reincarnated being unable to confirm that it’s them.
I like the idea of karma too so maybe I should become a Buddhist. Nah. Not sure I’m cut out for all that meditation and temple visit. You see, another chance to turn it all around shunned.
To be honest I’m still holding out hope of some astounding scientific discovery being made before my candle gets permanently snuffed out. The ageing process reversed so I can re-discover the exuberance of youth rather than, come mid-afternoon, feeling in need of a nap.
I want to be like Highlander and live forever but as a young man. I’m not ready to be old and don’t think I ever will be. You’re supposed to be at peace with yourself, and the world, at my age but I’m not. You’re supposed to have it all sussed but I don’t. I feel restless and dissatisfied.
It’s awkward territory post-40. Dancing at wedding reception discos suddenly has the potential to be a humiliating spectacle. Staring at attractive, younger women makes you feel like a lech. And it’s difficult to know what to wear. You don’t want to look boring and square but you can’t be too flash and young looking either because it screams mid-life crisis. The wrong clothes choice can be as tragic as the 6th form Geography teacher trying too hard to get down with the kids by saying things like, ‘Hey, is that Jay-Z guy cool, or what?’.
My life feels like it has gone into fast forward despite failing to get anything worthwhile done. If it continues to speed up then you may as well put me in my coffin now.
It has elapsed at such a rate of knots I’ve started to lose track of entire decades. Where have the Noughties gone? I recall writing the day’s date at the top of the page back at primary school. Now I struggle to keep track of what year it is, let alone which month. It takes me until around October to finally start writing the correct year on cheques.
I ask myself whether life is going in the direction I want but it feels too late to even pose the question. My destiny has already set the table for me. All I have to look forward to is thwarted career ambitions, greying temples and a slow inescapable demise towards incontinence pants and certain, unfulfilled death.
The mark you hope to leave comes into stark focus post-40 because that egg-timer is already as good as half-empty, and you take a long, hard look at yourself and realise how little you’ve actually achieved, and how little energy you have left to keep on striving.
Remember the coconut shy at the fairground and, as a teenager, giving it your best throw and failing to hit a single one, and standing there thinking, ‘Fuck. I want another go. I could do so much better next time.’? Well, that’s what life feels like post-40 and it sucks.
But things could still change. It’s not all over yet. Hell no, because, ‘Every passing minute is another chance to turn it all around.’ Or do everything exactly the same way as before, and continue to eke your way through life. Doesn’t really have the same ring to it. does it, but it’s closer to the truth and, like ear hair and the enjoyment of cookery shows, one of the gloomier facets of the ageing process.
I am hereby calling it, The Unbearable Shiteness Of Being. Could be a book title in that, I reckon.

Dear oh dear. Louis Walsh having some work done. Following Cowell’s botox and Dannii Minogue’s botox, and whatever else she’s had souped up and re-done. And there was Sharon Osborne before her, who admitted to spending over £300,000 on plastic surgery. How repugnant is that? I’ve not even earned that much in total over the last 15 years. And she’s squandered it all in a desperate, vanity-driven, and ultimately failed bid to stay young and glamorous looking.

And not forgetting Anne ‘The Weakest Link’ Robinson whose face is starting to resemble a frozen lake. One false move by her eyebrow and like a lone skater venturing onto it, you can imagine her entire visage shattering into a thousand pieces. And all the botox in the world cannot conceal the fact she is a craggy-voiced harridan presiding over one of the most tedious quizzes ever conceived of.

The way she gargles croakily the words, ‘You are the weakest link goodbye,’ in her dominatrix gear is seriously creepy. She creeps me out more than Davros the leader of The Daleks used to when I was a small boy.

And yet, while I can slaughter these famous people for being superficial, so pitifully caught up in their pursuit of beauty, I, too, feel the same overwhelming pressure to look my best. I’m 41 but still try to dress like something out of the Arctic Monkeys. It’s pathetic but I can’t help myself because the same self-obsessed vanity has silently crept into my psyche.

People of my vintage are collectively struggling to accept middle age, intoxicated by our obsession to cling on to the last vestiges of youth. It’s like everything these days – seeking a maximum return through greater marketing, in this case, of the self.

It’s telling that while the lad mags are all biting the dust. Men’s Health is blossoming. This is joyful, carefree hedonism being replaced by rampant narcissism. Men’s Health is a mag sold on the premise/downright lie we can all have a six-pack like the male model on the front cover without too much effort. It’s about aspiring to physical perfection but what about the values inside, do they not count any more? Forget the gym, how about getting to know Jim?

The mind warp this is having on future generations can already be seen. Walk down any provincial high street on a Friday night and you’ll see groups of late teens and 20-something men hitting the town looking like something out of McFly. Primped and preened, bleached hair spiked up, all cutesy, pretty boy earrings and designer eyebrows. They’ve probably even been on the sunbed and had their teeth laser whitened.

What is this obsession with white teeth and a sunbed tan? I had to wear sunglasses for the duration of this summer”s Ashes due to Shane Warne’s dazzling white gnashers. Jesus Christ, look at him too long and you were at serious risk of having your retinas burnt out. And for the last time women, a fake tan doesn’t make you look better, it makes you look like a cheap whore.

All this conceit is thanks in no small measure to the brainwashing effect of the tabloids, celeb mags and the trashy, looks-obsessed output we have on tv, in particular, shows like ‘Ten Years Younger’.

I wonder how much more crass and vulgar tv can get. The most appalling moment comes at the end when the woman is presented to her husband and family, having had the fat sucked out of her stomach and thighs, her cheek bones chiselled, breasts lifted, skin soldered, hips smoothed down with a lathe, and the pièce de résistance, her labia reconstructed.

It reminds me of that moment in ‘Team America’. ‘The surgery has been a complete success Gary, or should I say, Ahmed.’ And Gary looks a total mess.

‘I can’t believe it. She’s like a new woman. She looks amazing. I’m really pleased,’ says the teary-eyed husband, salivating at the prospect of taking this stranger home and fucking her senseless.

No shit, she’s a new woman. Her body is more reconstituted than a box of Chicken McNuggets.

I fear this is going to become the norm. ‘Yeah, I was feeling let down by my wife’s sagging lady lumps and as for her front bottom, the description ‘a wizard’s sleeve’ springs to mind. I told her to either go and get everything re-upholstered or I would replace her with a younger model. Now I’m delighted.’

Yeah, that’s because you’re making love to someone who has been re-built to such a degree the next time you try and enter her you’ll probably end up shattering her pelvis. I suggest you go and buy yourself one of these instead:

http://www.fleshlight.com/fleshlight-motion/

Hand in hand with all this superficiality, what we are witnessing is an intellectual Holocaust because the virulent message given off by celeb culture is that to make it in life you’ve got to look great and nothing else matters. Allowed to go unchecked we will end up with a master race of air-headed beautiful people and Hitler’s Aryan template will become a reality.

We will no longer discourse over the nature of free will versus determinism; we’ll be chatting about which conditioner to use to give our hair the greatest volume. Art that shines a light on the human condition will be shunned in favour of trying to decide which Armani suit to wear, and how to cultivate the perfect designer stubble.

I, for one, am determined to take a stand and intend to start by ringing up one of those writhing, fake-breasted, bimbos working on a teenage tv wank channel and hit her with a philosophical poser.

‘Ya alright love… ooh, I’m getting so horny imagining your hard…’

‘I’ve got a question for you?’

‘Have ya now. Ooh, I bet it’s something really naughty, isn’t it?’

‘Given that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, is there any such thing as death or is it merely a transition to another plane?’

Put away the Jessica Rabbit vib 2000 and deliberate on that.

I encourage others to embark on similar initiatives, not for my sake but for the sake of humanity.

http://www.lowmorale.co.uk/creep/flash/lm_creep_%28FLASH%29.swf

I make no apology for using another Prodigy-inspired headline, nor for having another rant about tv ads but before that there’s something else I need to get off my chest. These people who ring in radio stations, proudly declaring, ‘I’ve never had a sick day in my life for 40 years’, ‘I do an 18-hour day’, I’m self-employed so can’t afford to take a day off’, blah, blah, blah.
Be honest, you don’t work hard. You’re too busy watching Jeremy Kyle and tossing off to Jenny Powell and that hot new woman who dishes out the letters on Countdown in her short red dress. And if you do work hard, whoopy-fucking-do. So do we all.
I confess I, too, became briefly fixated by Powell. She had this slot on one of those simpleton-insulting daytime TV quiz segments on Channel Five just before Neighbours came on where she kept on, with a come hither smile on her face, about her ‘alternative route of entry’.
That gorgeous olive skin, the twinkle in those dark Latin eyes… She was talking about how to enter the word quiz, but that didn’t stop my subversive mind going into overdrive. It’s a symptom of the Internet’s gutter influence that I was incapable of hearing Powell use this turn of phrase without thinking, ‘Yeah, and I bet you’re not averse to a bit of ‘alternative route of entry’ yourself, are you, you saucy minx.’
The modern parlance for Powell is M.I.L.F., I do believe. Well, I don’t believe, I know. It’s another vaguely repugnant description this Internet corrupted world has thrust upon us.
So, anyway, these self-employed people yapping on about how great they are on FiveLive phone-ins. If you’re so busy, what are you doing on the phone telling listeners about it? Haven’t you got work to do? Why do they want to make out they’re such heroes? They’re worse than those big-headed entrepreneurs on Dragon’s Den. Like that Peter Smug-face, who is such a Rambo of business he can currently be seen acting like a tw*t flogging moneysupermarket.com.
Ever wondered, by the way, why it is when you change channels these days it’s always adverts, and you flick channels again and it’s ads, and again and it’s yet more ads. Have the advertisers got in our heads so much they know exactly, before we do, when we’re going to try and change channels? It’s uncanny. It’s like when you flick to the cricket and a wicket always falls.
If you share my world view you watch tv ads with a combination of withering disdain and sheer outrage. I find it hard to accept any viewer who can boast brain cells in double figures could respond positively to the feeble ‘cleverness’ and sheer inanity so consistently showcased.
Did you see that recent car ad with that imbecile making strange noises as he told the customer about its finer points? What was that about? And remember the Ford one? ‘Look at us. Aren’t we cool and clever. Playing instruments made out of a car.’ Who goes out and purchases a car based on this kind of drivel?
Merely the voice of that Churchill dog makes me want to commit random acts of cruelty to any Basset hounds within the vicinity. And what about that bloke on the water slide selling BarclayCard? It is so banal. You can imagine the people at the ad agency high fiving one another for coming up with it.
‘Oh, you’re gonna love this. A middle aged bloke with a paunch in Speedo swimming trunks going down a waterslide. He smiles at the check-out girl swiping his card while grabbing some bananas. He is chased by a little yapping dog.’
‘Oh yes, that’s genius. You’re really on to something there, Quentin.’
Not sure why I called him Quentin there, just felt a stupid name added an extra level of scorn to proceedings.
Lineker still dressing up like only a huge sell-out could, grinning stupid faces like only a huge sell-out could, selling Walker’s crisps, most recently with Cat Deeley in tow. Nausea-inducing. And what about that wretched 118 mob who have taken their thievery of David Bedford’s image to new levels. ‘Who ya gonna call?’ Not you.
But the messages clearly rub off on people because you’ll hear them repeating buzz phrases taken from these terrible ads. It used to be, ‘WAZZZZUPPPP!’ Now it’s ‘Compare the Meerkat.com, Simples’. If you think that’s humour, I suggest you dig out your Little & Large videos and laugh along to those instead.
I have begun to wonder whether ad agencies are just taking the piss. It’s surely the only explanation for that current abomination of a NatWest ad. You know the one. Blond woman with annoying hair, and even more annoying voice, taking us through her fun-filled, action-packed day working at the local branch.
The actors pretending to be real members of public in this nauseating shit need to be lined up and shot. If you’re that desperate for cash, go and rob banks. There’s more dignity in that.
‘I’ve come to pay in some business cheques, if that’s ok.’
No, it’s not ok. Your acting is wooden and your starring in a lamentable tv ad. Who the hell talks like that in real life?
They used to have another one – at least I think it was NatWest – when the patronising bank manager said to the customer, ‘‘You’re asset rich but cash poor.’
What the fuck? Perhaps I have it wrong. Perhaps others find these ads informative, harmless and amusing. No, I’m sorry you must have shit for brains if you enjoy that NatWest ad.
‘I take it you’re still single with no dependents,’ she says, smiling inanely at the young daughter before giggling with all the naturalness of a hostage victim being told to laugh with a gun held to their head.
If I was the actor playing the dad in that scene, I would have come in with some improvised, off-the-cuff lines.
‘Are you trying to insinuate that my 14-year-old daughter has been sleeping around, got herself up the stick and has kids already. How fucking dare you.’
But then, joy of joys, comes that uplifting NatWest backtune to end this corporate monstrosity – ‘Woooo-ooo, woooo-oooo, wooo-o-ooooo-ooooo.’ Might need a spell check on those lyrics.
I think it’s the fact that I, as a consumer, am supposed to feel all happy inside watching this jaunty little episode that I find so insulting. This, and the fact other members of public open NatWest accounts on the back of this shit and carry on with their ‘Simples’ thinking it qualifies them as Ricky Gervais.
I mean, come on. What chance do you have if you possess a shred of intelligence and taste in this country?
Time for some respite and today’s soul-reviving insert comes as a tribute to the passing of the late, great Mr Patrick Swayze and in particular his role in a generation-defining movie. Well, it was defining for me, striking at the heart of the human condition. And no, I’m not referring to that much-loved chick flick he starred in, but the brilliant ‘Point Break’ and Swayze’s finest hour playing Bodhi.

You know you see that spinning rainbow disc on a Mac screen when it’s struggling to keep up. I have become that disc in human form.
I know I’ve mentioned this before but the busyness of modern life is driving me round the bend. Old media, new media. Twitter, Facebook, blogs, texts, emails… And that’s before catching a bit of tv or radio, if I can find time.
We have created so much to do, so much to choose from, that I’ll start walking in one direction, pre-occupied with the task at hand, only for another task to pop into my mind, and override the initial thought, causing me to stop and turn direction. But as I make my way there I’ll stop again, as another task jumps the queue, screaming out to be done. To observe me, I look like a malfunctioning robot, unable to process all the information bombarding my circuit boards. Like I say, I’m Spinning Disc Man.
And we’re starting to communicate like robots too, with our text abbreviations and our must-be-140-characters-or-less ‘Tweets’, all url shorteners, @ signs and RTs (that’s ‘Re-Tweet’ for the uninitiated). I know I said Twitter is for twats and I stand by that even if I, too, am now officially a twat for using it.
We are being asked to assimilate such an insane amount of information, there aren’t enough hours in the day to deal with it all. I think human kind is getting towards its limit. Soon, we’ll need to be opened up and further RAM be installed to cope with the demands being put on us. It has already gone too far. At least part of my day is now spent emailing Internet companies requesting a password reminder. Only for me to forget it again, within a second of having to reset it.
We don’t discourse on a personal level with friends any more. We don’t have the time or the wherewithal. Even writing an email has become too arduous. I find it is now the last thing I do each day, if I can be bothered, at around midnight, just before going to bed. Trying to summon the energy to drop a friend a quick line on email. What is happening to us? Have we become so self-absorbed, so inward-looking, so busy, that even friends are becoming obsolete? What chance do relationships have if this is the future of western civilisation?
It would be easier to shun it all. Become an analogue antiquity because if you try to join in, you are left struggling to keep up, as the new media age quickens away from you like Usain Bolt. I swear it won’t be long before I have to take my laptop to the crapper with me, just to try and stay on top of everything while keeping everyone abreast of my latest movements. Bowel movements that is. Google Alert! Google Alert! Rob has just taken a dump.
But hey, let’s share all this with the world at large via Twitter. Another task we have created for ourselves – reporting back on our day. But doesn’t this itself expose a certain loneliness; a spiritual void? When your life is preoccupied with reporting life to strangers, aren’t you completing the circle marked ‘exercise in futility’?
Call me a miserable cynic – and the case for the prosecution is damning, I’ll freely admit – but I don’t believe people put stuff in their Tweets and on Facebook for altruistic reasons. It’s all a beauty contest in a world gone beyond superficial.
We no longer want to live quietly and humbly in anonymity, we want to live a sexy, reported life in public, and command an audience. We are copying the reality stars and tabloid celebs we have been force fed for the last decade, and it’s so out of whack it’s not funny.
Twitter is an exercise in self-obsession and self-promotion. There’s a massive amount of ego involved in saying, ‘Look at me, aren’t my Tweets supremely sharp and witty. I’ve got something interesting to share with you. Check out this wacky web link. Look at my hilarious browsing discoveries’.
It’s all about the image you convey and more time is being spent creating the spangly facade than actually living any sort of life behind it. Unsurprisingly, Twitter has already become the latest media outlet to be hijacked by celebrities. They have infiltrated it like an aggressive form of cancer.
Well, if you can’t beat them, join them, I say, so from now on I will be attempting to sell this site to the masses via Twitter. I do, however, have a massive barrier to overcome. People are increasingly allergic to words. If you’ve got this far well done by the way. Not enough time, you see, especially when it comes to the scribings of a complete nobody.
And so, from this point on, I will be including video of other people’s work I consider meritorious in a transparent and no doubt failed bid to get your attention. And just as a quick aside, let me tell you that trying to figure out how to embed YouTube video, and activate widgets in WordPress, and trying, and failing, to transfer past blog post comments (yes, actually, I did have a few) is a time-consuming pain in the arse. No doubt the media celebs have their own personal Internet lackeys to do all this shit but some of us around here have to work out this stuff for ourselves.
I must cut this short as another task is demanding my attention. And now an icon tells me an email has just popped into my in-box, and I’ve not even ‘Tweeted’ yet today. Or visited YouTube to see the clip of Serena Williams losing it at the US Open. And now I don’t know what to do next. You see, Spinning Disc Man.