31st December:

Today is a day that serves no purpose other than to end.

30th December:

The New Year beckons and television is stuffed to the gunnels with serious commentators stroking their chins and musing over the current affairs that made the news in 2006. Does anyone know what the collective noun is for Dimblebys? A dirth, perhaps? Answers on a postcard, please. Thank god for the Muppets.

The 5 day period between Christmas and New Year is an odd time - a kind of temporal black hole between two huge hangovers. The choices seem stark: go shopping, drink your way through it or join in with the retrospective navel gazing, do your duty and try to come to some kind of meaningful conclusion about the 12 months just gone. Having decided that the country is going down the pan and the government are idiots, you may then wish to ponder the 12 months ahead and set yourself some goals, like learning the piano, or taking up Italian, or getting fit. Safe in the knowledge that all of these will have gone out of the window before the stilton in the fridge has gone off or the tree has come down, never mind been uplifted by the binmen. Which is usually around the same time as the Easter eggs start appearing on supermarket shelves.

The ancient Romans believed that people did not stand facing the future but instead had their backs to it so that as time passed you could only see events around you in the present and events that had already occured. The number of Romans who died crossing at traffic lights is unknown, but the model is an interesting one. So, here's to 2007 and the prospect of another 12 months of more-of-the-same.

Probably.

Although you never know.

It might turn out more like 1992.

29th December:

When your congenial host was just a nipper, the phenomenon used to be referred to as the 'January Sales'. The principle was a simple one: on the first weekend after the New Year the shops opened and all stock was reduced. These days, however, it is a rarity to see any retail outlet not open at 7am on the 26th of December peddling three year old stock and assorted detritus specifically bought in from a Chinese warehouse to the masses as 'genuine bargains'.
If they even wait until the 26th...

This whole ritual of elbowing your way through the throngs with a banging hangover and rifling through bins of badly organised and mislabeled tat is a uniquely British affair, and once more I feel that we could learn a thing or two from our continental cousins. In France, for example, sales are regulated by the government. They happen twice a year, must start and end on specific dates, and reductions have to be applied to all items already in stock - it is illegal to buy stock in specifically for sales and this law is strictly enforced by the local authorities. All sounds a bit more civilised, doesn't it? And a bit more in tune with the whole concept of what a sale should actually be. Unless you do actually want to buy a size 20 bikini in December.

In the weeks leading up to Christmas this year, analysts suggested that sales of goods via the medium of the Interweb would be up 40% compared to 2005. High Street shops have apparently been taking a serious gubbing from their on-line counterparts, and the novel and imaginative response from the major city-centre retailers has been to start their sales earlier. And they wonder why they are heading the way of the Dodo...

Do us all a favour. If you must have a Christmas sale, give us a couple of days to recover from the Christmas pud and that last glass of cheap port and then open at 9am, having marked everything in the store down by at least 15%.

Oh, and do it quietly. I'll still be in bed.

27th December:

Most of the major High Street banks make, it would not be unfair to say, a filthy amount of profit every year. Which would be fine if they were a bit more...upfront about it. Rather than kidding on that they are your friend.

Your congenial host found himself today the recipient of a phone call from his bank (here's a big clue: RBS) who wished to conduct what they referred to as a 'banking review'. Which amounted to some poor woman trying to sell me a whole host of products and services that I clearly wasn't interested in.

"I see that you don't have any savings accounts with us, Sir".
"Yes, that is correct. I have savings accounts with other banks that offer me higher rates of interest than you. However, i'd be happy to switch these savings to you if you can match the interest rate and offer me a suitable additional incentive".
*deathly silence*
"Would you be interested in a credit card?"
"No thank you. I have two already, both of which offer me lower rates of interest than your cards".
"How about a mortgage?"
"No thanks. I looked at your mortgage products two years ago and found them to be uncompetitive".

RBS was one of the first major banks to introduce a current account that charges a monthly fee. Their argument has always been that this kind of account brings with it a whole host of additional services that are worth far more than the measly 6 Pounds a month fee incurred. Which is clearly, if you'll forgive me, contemptable bollocks. Discounts off foreign holidays booked through the bank? Preferential rates on personal loans that are already about 2% APR greater than other competitors? Commission-free foreign exchange? Hold me back...

At the end of the day, this fee boils down to the bank charging you for the privilege of holding your money. And making a very handsome profit as a result. The very notion that anyone has actually signed up for this kind of account suggests to me that the average RBS customer is either incredibly lazy (and would happily say yes to anything for a quiet life) or is oafish in the extreme. Douse myself in vodka and run through that ring of fire? Ah, hell, why not...

The day may come when I receive a phone call telling me that my free current account is being withdrawn, and it is 6 Pounds a month or nothing. In which case, i'll have to close the account and vote with my feet. However, when that day does come I will have a suspicion that the person on the other end of the line breaking the bad news to me probably didn't get into banking to become a commission-based salesperson. And is probably pretty cheesed off too.

25th December:

A merry Christmas to one and all.

There is a lot to be said for attempting to set a new world record for champagne drinking.

In a break with tradition this year, your congenial host watched Her Maj's Christmas message to the peasants. She talked about the wonderful work that is done in the community. Which she presumably sees all the time. From a plush seat, behind triple-glazed windows.

More to the point, we mourn the passing of the self-proclaimed 'Godfather of Soul', Mr. James Brown. Life is not about finding ourselves, it is about creating ourselves, and Mr. Brown was indeed a prime illustration of this maxim. He was also proof positive that a little touch of genius frequently goes hand-in-hand with a little touch of madness.

Whatever you do over the holidays, make it funky.

23rd December:

In 1997, a not-for-profit organisation called “The Project for the New American Century” appeared in the US, and its stated aim was to project American power and influence across the globe. Sounds a little Third Reich-y, doesn’t it?

The organisation’s web site boldly proclaimed that it was a non-profit educational organisation dedicated to a few fundamental propositions: “that American leadership is good both for America and for the world; and that such leadership requires military strength, diplomatic energy and commitment to moral principle”. The rest of the world not being able to make decisions for itself, so it would seem.

And thus the school of neo-conservatism was born.

The organisation’s mission statement, written in 1997 and signed by such luminaries as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, set out a belief in a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promoted American principles abroad. Whether those pesky Johnny Foreigners liked it or not, one assumes.

As has been noted elsewhere on these pages, this grand plan to secure America’s prominent place in the 21st Century fell down in a few key areas: it assumed that the rest of the world was interested in American principles and receptive to the message. Which has proven not to be the case. Much to the befuddlement of the current administration. It also assumed that the foreign policy message itself was worth listening to. Please see above.

America’s behaviour in the foreign policy arena over the last 20 years has been less than commendable - propping up a dictator here whilst funding rebels fighting to overthrow another dictator there, whilst all the time keeping a beady eye on anywhere there might be a strategically significant drop of oil or two. At times, America has reminded your congenial host of a child who joined his school in 1982 – a child who was significantly bigger than the other kids and, as far as we could work out, not quite right upstairs. Most of us kept out of his way and he was hastily moved on to another educational establishment after beating two of his classmates to a pulp one day when they teased him about being dim. Actions speak louder than words and America’s actions have made it difficult for the rest of the world to believe that US foreign policy has been based on anything other than self-interest, and woe betide anyone who happens to get in the way.

Bush’s plummeting approval ratings and the recent election mauling seem to suggest that neo-conservatism is crawling towards its deathbed. We can only hope that is replaced with a school of political thought that values engagement over interference and imposition, and knows how to use its brain more than its brawn.

America is not the centre of the civilised world and needs to stop behaving as if it was.

22nd December:

The on-line travel service TripAdvisor polled 4000 of its customers in Autumn of this year and Ryanair were voted the world’s ‘least liked airline’.

A spokesman from Ryanair hit back in typically bullish manner. "Ryanair carries more UK passengers than any other airline because it has both lowest fares and the best punctuality and its passengers ignore irrelevant and baseless surveys," the company said. "The public votes with its feet".

Yes, but since when did the public ever know what it was talking about? Popularity cannot always be taken as an indication of quality.

A poll of most Ryanair customers would, at best, highlight that the airline is OK when everything runs to plan. At worst, you’d get a grunt and maybe a “s’cheap, innit?” Questions such as “would you be prepared to pay a little more for allocated seating?” or “do you think the drinks and snacks we offer on-board represent good value for money?” are unlikely to be asked. Either way, I can’t imagine that anyone would eulogise and claim the company to be the best thing since sliced bread. Stale, sliced bread with a prawn mayonnaise filling for £4.99, presumably.

The people who fly Ryanair do so for one of only two reasons: they live near a small regional airport served by Ryanair (i.e. convenience) or they can’t afford to fly with a decent airline (i.e. economics). Both are perfectly understandable, but let’s not kid ourselves that the reasons are any more scientific than this. Punctuality and ticket price are the main drivers and to suggest that anything else matters is ludicrous.

The process of democratisation is generally a good thing, and I am in no way suggesting that foreign travel should be the privilege of the few rather than the choice of the many. However, the best way to judge a company is how they respond when things do not go according to plan, and Ryanair’s performance in this sphere can best be described as lamentable. In times of inconvenience they have historically treated their customers with something akin to contempt and it is for this reason, and this reason alone, that 4000 people voted as they did. The sad thing is that it’s unlikely to make a blind bit of difference.

Maybe it's about time the public really did start voting with their feet.

21st December:

It's the Winter soltice today - a time when people all over Britain will seek out ancient standing stones to dance naked around. For 2 minutes. Before running back inside for a warming bowl of soup.

Reports today suggest that UK historian David Irving may soon be released from prison in Austria after serving 10 months of a 3 year sentence for denying the Holocaust.

11 countries in the world currently have laws against Holocaust denial, but the UK has traditionally resisted calls to create such legislation. And with good reason, I think.

On the face of it, Mr. Irving is part of a small group of people who have suggested that the scale of the Holocaust was, to put it bluntly, grossly exaggerated. Whilst the vast majority of people, your congenial host included, may find these views unpalatable, I question the wisdom of (and need for) legislation that makes these views punishable by a prison sentence.

Let’s face it, whether 2 or 6 or 26 million people died in concentration camps, I don‘t think any reasonable person would deny that it was a dark moment in humanity’s history and should never be allowed to happen again. Nor do I think that the same reasonable people would believe that the views held by Mr. Irving are representative of the public at large. Is it not therefore sufficient to simply write off Mr. Irving’s views as being unworthy of our attention and let him spout off in the corner facing the wall? Do we have to make an example of him and throw him in jail? It’s a potentially worrying affair…

I’m also a little unnerved by those people who have demanded the most punitive of sentences for Mr. Irving and those who may share his views. What do we achieve by sending a man to jail for 10 years for expressing an opinion? Is this justice?

Certainly, those of us who have never experienced war or ethnic cleansing first-hand cannot begin to imagine how terrible it must be. It is perhaps a little too easy for people of my generation to say ‘forgive and forget’ never having had our lives touched in this way. However, our generation is our generation, and many of us do question the wisdom of jailing Holocaust deniers just as much as we question the value of chasing octogenarian ex-members of the Nazi party across South America 60 years after the war in the quest for ‘justice’.

Many Jewish people will have found Mr. Irving’s views offensive. Many Muslim people were offended by cartoons that appeared in a certain Danish newspaper. I am offended by Pete Doherty. How do we rank 'offensivness' and how do we decide when legal intervention is required and what the nature of that intervention should be?

Apart from deporting Pete Doherty, of course. That’s a no-brainer.

20th December:

Headline of the day yesterday came from the BBC News website - "Blair unable to influence Bush".

I sympathise. When I was a lad, many were the drunken Friday nights when I found myself in exactly the same position.

19th December:

The innocence of childhood is something that we fight hard to preserve in these increasingly commercial and cynical times.

Officials at the Disney Epcot Park in Florida apparently told a man to sort impersonating Santa. The man in question, a Mr. James Worley, just happened to be wearing a red shirt and had a long grey beard. He had been approached by children asking if he was Santa Claus and, not wishing to disappoint, had played along. However, Mr. Worley was allegedly told that Disney had its own Santa at Epcot and his actions were therefore confusing the children. An unnamed official at the ‘amusement’ park apparently told Mr. Worley that Santa was “considered a Disney character”. Which may come as news to Coca-Cola, who presumably thought he belonged to them. I expect Santa’s agent has been fielding angry phone calls all weekend.

The House of the Mouse has a long history of being rather po-faced about the whole business of having fun. Little events like these seem to suggest that Disney is happy for you to enjoy yourself, but only on their terms and only as long as you have paid the full ticket price. It’s fun, kids, but with a slightly sinister grin that is showing just a few too many teeth.

I’ve never gone for Disney’s unique brand of schmaltz. Personally, I find the smell a little too sweet, overpowering and artificial. Like bathroom air freshener just after someone has dropped a big one in the downstairs loo. Ahhh, eau de lemony dump.

Disney is now a massive sales and marketing empire and has become expert at relieving befuddled parents everywhere of their hard-earned cash. Whilst wearing pantaloons and a little too much pancake. Film + merchandise + fast food chain tie-in + video game + theme park ride = winner. Long gone are the days when the films had charm and character, replaced it seems with big-name voiceover actors, Oscar winning soundtracks and production budgets larger than the GDP of many third-world nations.

There is nothing wrong with a little fantasy, nor with encouraging children to believe that there is still a little magic left in the world. However, watching a bunch of toothsome 25 year olds in garish fancy dress being paid minimum wage to parade every 6 times a day down the Boulevard of Candyfloss-coated Dreams might not necessarily be the way you want to do it.

Mind you, that Pirates of the Caribbean was a bit good, wasn’t it?

18th December:

It should quite simply not be possible to place the word 'mentored' on the board during a game of Scrabble and score a whopping 75 points, and then go on and lose the game.

It just shouldn't.

17th December:

Some golden rules to assist you in your nagivation of the political minefield that is the office Christmas party:

1. If partners are invited, take your partner. They will be a sober and steadying influence and you will thank them in the morning. Their presence will also dramatically increase the likelihood of you ending up in bed with someone who wants to have sex with you for all the right reasons.
2. No more than 2 apperatifs before the meal. It's a marathon, not a sprint.
3. Yes, there is free wine on the table but it will give you a monster hangover the next day because it is Chilean sheep-dip. Drink no more than half a bottle, have plenty of water and save yourself for the post-coffee brandies.
4. Eileen in Accounts does scrub up pretty well and has been giving you a bit of the eye all evening but she is realistically old enough to be your mum. Besides, she is married but is conspicuously not wearing her wedding ring. Retire to the bar and the safety of blokey chat and another brandy.
5. Dave, a student who completed a work placement with your company last summer, has been invited to the party and has brought Mandy, his 21 year old girlfriend. Mandy is blonde, pert and has turned up in kitten heels, a pencil skirt and a bustier. Every man in the room has been kicked under the table by their partner for looking a little too blatantly at Mandy's arse and Dave suddenly has a lot of new best friends. The DJ (Brian, a 45 year old bloke in a cardigan who thinks he's edgy because he has played one song in the current top ten) has made one cringworthy comment about Mandy's Christmas stockings and is about to get a serious ticking off from the Managing Director's PA. Retire to the bar and the safety of blokey chat and another brandy.
6. Please note that it is obligatory to get up and dance. Especially to ABBA. Regardless of how stupid you feel. Even if you usually listen to thrash metal. Just don't look at Mandy's arse.
7. The MD and other company directors will leave the venue after the coffee and the first song. You may think that this is some kind of magnanimous gesture designed to ensure that you can relax, let your hair down and enjoy the evening without feeling like the boss is keeping an eye on you. This is not the case. This is entirely for your boss's benefit, not yours - he does not need to see you drunk nor wish to know what you really think of him.
8. Resist the urge to tell anyone what you really think of them. Or how much you earn.
9. Resist the urge to take pictures of anyone or pose for the same. Especially if novelty headgear is involved.
10. Dancing should be done on the dance-floor and not on any other surface. Especially not if it is elevated. This is not Amsterdam.
10. If you are staying at the venue, do not tell anyone nor divulge your room number.
11. Do not schedule anything of importance for the following day. Keep to a strict regime - regular cups of tea, crap telly, pepto-bismol and a long afternoon snooze.

Happy hangover!

16th December:

Christmas is, as every schoolboy knows, a time for giving. A time for reflection, tolerance, peace and understanding. Until you have to put up the Christmas tree. At which point, tolerance goes out the window and petty bickering becomes the order of the day.

Strange, is it not, how the simple act of finding an appropriate corner of a room, plonking a tree in it and then chucking on a few coloured baubles can suddenly take on day-ruining proportions. You congenial host theorises that we have all mistakenly been conditioned into thinking that this process should somehow be 'fun'. We have images in our heads of small children sitting on the floor and passing sparkly trinkets to their mother who lovingly places them on the tree, as father watches on. For some reason, lots of brylcreem, flowery aprons and a pipe also feature heavily in this scene, although that might just be me. The truth, of course, is far more terrible.

There is an undoubted sense of satisfaction to be had from sitting down afterwards admiring the fruits of one's handiwork - this is a given. In this sense, however, the whole process strikes me as being somewhat similar to gardening, in which case I would strongly recommend that there is good money to be made by someone out there who is prepared to relieve us of our decorative anxieties by offering their services as a Christmas Tree Installation and Adornment Consultant.

Say, 60 quid for a fully decorated 5 footer? Worth every penny...

13th December:

Another entry from the file entitled "You couldn't make it up":

Two sets of clinical trials in Africa seem to have proved that circumcision can cut the rate of HIV infection in hetereosexual males by up to 50%. The name of the expert from the WHO who was overseeing these trials?

Wait for it...

Dr. Kevin De Cock.

I laughed so hard I am undoubtedly going to hell.

12th December:

Happy Birthday to me.

It's not all glamour - it took a long hot bath, almost a full bottle of Bollinger and several Cafe del Mar CDs before I began to feel vaguely human again.

The moral of the tale? Take your birthday off.

11th December:

Apparently, there are unsavoury types out there on the other side of our living room windows who are involved in such nefarious activities as drug dealing and illegal money lending. These ventures regularly generate large amounts of paper money that has to be laundered in some way or another. Up until recently, the method du jour was the backstreet tanning salon. In some parts of Glasgow, Manchester and London tanning salons were regularly ‘earning’ over £200,000 per week. If these earnings were legitimate, our major conurbations should have been teeming with people bearing a pallor akin to the product of an unholy union between a Satsuma and a 2x4 piece of mahogany. Which was clearly not the case. Although a weekend visit to one of the many city-centre pubs might convince you otherwise.

The most recent approach has apparently involved stretch-limo companies. Chief Superintendent Geraint Anwel, chairman of the National Roads Policing Intelligence Forum, has just led an investigation into these unregulated firms and has surmised that change is needed. To quote the man with the scrambled egg on his hat, “We have seen, on a number of occasions, some pretty unsavoury people….inside these vehicles”. Yes, and those are just the paying punters. Which makes you wonder why the makers of these slapper-attractors even bother fitting tinted windows when they are permanently open. Just add Lambrini and a Vengaboys CD, mix well and stand as far back as possible. Or you’ll get whistled at. By a group of large women from Barnsley on a hen-night. With inappropriate hemlines.

I once saw a cyclist being heckled by the occupants of one of these munter-wagons at a set of traffic lights. Something to do with the chamois shorts, I assumed. Clearly disgruntled, Lance Arse-strong shouted “show us your tits” in the direction of the rapidly disappearing limo.

Terrifyingly, they stopped the car and did.

10th December:

In the global fight against poverty, there is some terrific work being done by charities and NGOs all over the world. Unfortunately, however, there is also a great deal of money being wasted by certain organisations who see fit to offer charitable aid with one hand on the condition that the bible in the other hand is taken as well.

When women living in the Third World are educated they have an annoying habit of taking control of their reproductive rights and deciding not to have quite as many children as the Catholic church might like them to. It’s apparently not quite as important to them to keep up the number of sinners. Certain charitable foundations therefore target their aid in specific ways to ensure that people get fed and watered but also get churches rather than schools. Free word of God with every sack of corn.

This is, in the eyes of your congenial host, a disgraceful practice. If someone has been knocked down by a car, do we deny that person medical treatment on the basis of their religious beliefs or lack thereof? Of course not. Why then, do certain organisations feel it is appropriate to apply conditions to the delivery of aid and use their wealth (vs. people’s poverty) as a bargaining tool to further their own religious school of thought?

Here endeth the lesson.

9th December:

Another peek into the disturbing psyche of our colonial cousins - those with a delicate European constitution may wish to look away now...

Poperty developers in Nevada have built a 'Mediterranean-themed village' called Montelago, which sits 17 miles away from the main strip of Las Vegas (see www.montelagovillage.com for more details). According to the blurb, said village offers "exquisite shopping, dining, golfing and European-style gaming". Which probably means your croupier may have a distant Italian Great-Aunt. Not that this means he'll be any better at finding Italy on a map of Europe than the fat shorts-and-sandals-wearing punters on the other side of the blackjack table.

Your congenial host saw Montelago on the television this afternoon. "It's gorgeous" gushed a resident. And indeed it was. In a 'newly built and freshly painted village' kind of way. "When you are walking down to the steakhouse in the evening, you could almost be in Italy". A nation famous for its steakhouses, naturalmente. "And you can sit in the square, looking up at the sky.." she added. "..and it's a real sky, not just a painted one."
No, I don't know where she was going with that comment either.

So, there you have it. Visit Montelago for an authentic taste of the Mediterranean. With added steak. But without any pesky language problems. Or the need to change your money. Or any of that surly European attitude. Or flaky paint. And you can still get Fox News.

Honestly Bob, it was heaven.

8th December:

The last three weekends have involved trips to Stansted Airport to either pick up or drop off visiting family and friends. For reasons that I cannot yet fathom, each of these trips has been disrupted, one quite substantially, by accidents on the M11 between Cambridge and Bishop Stortford. Even more curiously, all of the incidents appear to have involved ariculated lorries and a number of cars, including a black 3-series BMW with Polish number plates.

What conclusions can be drawn from this recurring experience of bent Bavarian metal accompanied by the smell of roasted no claims bonus? It's hard to say, but I would either suggest that Poland has a unique surplus of 1980's 3-series Beemers and has therefore launched a government-funded scheme to pay learner drivers to visit the UK and write them off, or that Mr. Wladyslaw really does need his eyes tested after all.

Either way, if your taxi to the airport happens to be black, boxy and smelling of Barszcz (that's Borscht to you and I), I'd politely decline and take the train.

7th December:

The Iraq Study Group yesterday released its long awaited report into US policy and strategy in Iraq and, unsurprisingly, concluded that current tactics simply are not working. You could almost hear the sound of fingers being gnawed back to the knuckle at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Quote of the day came from Channel 4’s US correspondent when queried about the implications of the report. “Even if Bush doesn’t understand this report” he said, “enough people around him will, and will persuade him that change is now inevitable”. Priceless.

Americans are a funny bunch. Apologies to any Americans reading this (yes, I know it’s unlikely) but your congenial host has always had a bit of an issue with our colonial cousins. Their nation is geographically vast and many of them are neither particularly well-educated nor well-travelled. These factors combined mean that their outlook is sometimes insular and somewhat skewed. Don’t get me wrong, this is not some “what have the Romans ever done for us” diatribe, but there does often seem to be an arrogance and certainty about the American worldview that is, I wager, a little misguided.

I personally dislike the idea of forcing your ideology on someone else whether they want it or not. Democracy, most people would agree, is a good thing. Capitalism likewise, albeit with certain caveats. However, I do feel a little uncomfortable when I hear Bush talk of bringing freedom and democracy to the oppressed peoples of the world. Terrorist attacks on any country are never justifiable, but many Americans believe that The Terrible Events Of Nine Eleven™ were perpetrated by fanatics who were in some way jealous of America – jealous of the American way of life, of the social freedoms enjoyed by its citizens, of the liberal and egalitarian culture that it promotes. I think this is a flawed view.

If anything, the attacks were conducted by people who probably hated America for its arrogant foreign policy, its bloated self-importance and its support of a particular Zionist regime in the Middle East. Ironic, then, that yesterday’s report stresses the need for engagement with Syria and Iran, a lasting peaceful settlement for Palestinians and a wholesale diplomatic charm offensive across the entire region.

Shame we weren’t having this debate 30 years ago.

6th November:

Scientists appear to have found evidence of water, or a liquid of some kind, on the surface of Mars. If true, this could be the most dramatic event in the history of space exploration since a man first put his size nines on the moon. With water comes the genuine suggestion of life, albeit probably in bacteria form. However, it is still life on a planet other than our own, and offers up the tantalising prospect of more of the same elsewhere.

Nothing would please your congenial host more than proof of the existence of beings somewhere out there who are at least, if not more, intelligent that us. We humans are a pompous bunch, obsesssed wih our petty rivalries and our own importance. Can you imagine the effect it would have on homosapiens everywhere to learn that we neither unique nor alone?

It's a grandiose statement, perhaps, but if ever an event could truly bring humanity together and help bring life sharply into perspective, it would be this.

PS - If Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum happen to be reading this, stick around guys...you might come in handy.

5th December:

I recently heard a review of Bob Dylan’s latest album on BBC Radio 4. Almost ten minutes of airtime on a serious radio station were devoted to a journalist who was getting unnaturally frothy at the prospect of Dylan’s latest offering. “Seminal work and probably the most influential in twenty years”, he exclaimed. “This is not the Dylan of the cocktail lounge or the Dylan of the pulpit. This is the Dylan of the highway diner on Route 66”. Erm, right. Any good though?

The journalist was clearly a fan but I am intrigued as to how anyone can honestly and impartially review an album such as this. Dylan has clearly been around a while and has recorded a lot of stuff. How does one decide whether his latest album is any good or not without being influenced by (or referring to) his vast body of work to date? Would the resident hack have thought the album so great if it had been brought out by an unknown artist?

What makes the legend? Paul McCartney probably lives on the same rarefied plane as Dylan. He did some great, great stuff with The Beatles. In the intervening years since he has also, if we’re being honest, produced some mince. However, those formative years sealed the deal and he has spent the last twenty years doing what wants to safe in the knowledge that he has nothing left to prove. Albums have been a success and albums have bombed but the reputation has remained untarnished either way. Jammy sod.

The actor Daniel Day Lewis decided to throw in the acting towel a few years ago, upped sticks and took his family to Florence. Why? He wanted to learn how to make shoes. The cynics would argue that he was already a rich man and so could follow this passion (or flight of fancy) without actually have to care about whether or not he would be successful. Perhaps this is a fair point - maybe the people we should fete are those who take the risk and follow their hearts when their livelihoods actually do depend on making it work.

I can't help but feel slightly envious of the Dylans, the McCartneys and the Day-Lewis's of this world, though. Imagine having the freedom to produce literature, art, music or shoes just because you want to, without having to worry about sales - to express yourself as fully and openly as you wish without having to care about the public's perception or reaction.

Sounds liberating, doesn't it? And just a little scary...

4th December:

The author and comedian Ben Elton appeared on the ‘Parkinson’ chat show in the UK on Saturday night to promote his new novel that deals satirically (but also affectionately, apparently) with the whole issue of reality TV.

Mr. Elton said that he found TV shows like ‘X Factor’ and ‘Pop Idol’ compelling viewing and great entertainment but was concerned at the sinister undertones that flow gently but visibly below the surface.

I would go one step further: these shows are no better than the freak shows that toured the cities of the world in the late 1800’s. We find watching contestants on Big Brother voyeuristic and compelling in exactly the same way our contemporaries a century ago paid money to stare at the kid with the crab hands. What makes it even worse, in some ways, is that the contestants on reality TV shows are complicit and consenting because there is an endgame: fame. And their desperation for it is palpable. Bethany may have a face like a torn accordion and a voice that sounds like a cat being strangled, but she has to be allowed to go through to the next round because she is special and she has a dream™.

On paper, these shows shouldn’t work. In many other European countries they have not – they have been a spectacular failure as the public quickly saw through the façade and turned off. And yet we British, with our super-soar-away-tabloid mentality, have embraced these shows and allowed them to become embedded in popular culture. What does this say about our society? Despite the official party line, these shows are not valuable social experiments nor are they genuine attempts to unearth hidden talent. They are formulaic, manipulative money-making machines that take advantage of naïve people and generate massive profits thanks to premium rate phone lines that subsidise production costs. It’s an open secret that researchers are now going out of their way to find dysfunctional people to appear on these shows in order to make the viewing that little bit more spicy. But it’s just fun, right? Harmless fun and entertainment? I’m not so sure. As has been noted before, there seems to be only one real winner.

Some may wish to accuse me of intellectual snobbery but I think that would be missing the point. Your congenial host has no issue with either fun or entertainment - it is more the idea of that fun being had at the expense of personal privacy and dignity and through the exploitation of people’s hopes and dreams, regardless of how gullible those people may be.

Who is going to be king of the jungle this time? Frankly, I couldn’t care less…

3rd December:

Deep within the human brain lurks an innate, primeval desire to collect, categorise, classify and compartmentalise. This is a good thing, without which we would not have Botany, Philately or Pokémon.

Back when I were a lad, the cinema was a straight-forward affair. We had U films, PG films, 15 films, 18 films and the mythical X-rated films that, we imagined, would be shown in the dead of night at small, smoky ‘private member’ cinemas. I say ‘imagined’ because we lived in provincial Scotland, where the only comparably risqué thing one might see would involve some drunken oaf attempting to get his fat, similarly-drunken girlfriend’s underwear off in the back alley behind the local pub whilst simultaneously finishing off a deep-fried takeaway pizza.

Now, however, it would appear that a humble classification is no longer sufficient. A quick visit to the BBFC web-site reveals a whole new world of health warnings and consumer advice. One film currently on general release, for example, “contains ominous tone”. Ooooh, ominous! Another “contains very mild comic violence”. A third “contains scenes of mild peril”. Even more helpfully, one film is described as “containing infrequent strong language and moderate threat”. Moderate threat?? “I don’t think we should go and see ‘The Prestige’ tonight love. I know you like that Hugh Jackman but the film does contain moderate violence and fatalities.”

I’m all in favour of the protection of innocence, but I do find this kind of thing a step too far. Is the knowledge that the latest exercise in relieving you of your hard-earned by Disney contains “mild peril and scenes of fantasy” going to deter you from taking your squealing ankle-biter? Of course not. Think the average 19 year old really worries that their Friday night jaunt out to the local Odeon will result in them being exposed to “strong violence and frequent sexual references”?

Frankly, they’re probably counting on it!

1st December:

A happy advent to one and all.

Channel 4 in the UK has just announced that it has secured rights to the reality television show Big Brother until the year 2010, at a reported cost of £180 million. Honestly, I don't know where to start...
Horse. Dead. Flogging. Enough already. Please.

Whenever our body-fascist society is getting you down, it's worth remembering that Mother Nature probably plays cards. Roughly 5% of the poplulation are stunningly beautiful. The other 90% are OK-looking and the remaining 5% are complete munters. If you are in either of the former two groups, you'll probably be fine. Really, don't worry about it.