One-Eyed Seagull

For those of you who weren't aware (i.e. most of you), I used to write this thing called The Monthly Scandal. You can read some of it here, and more will be uploaded with time.

It was conceived as a biting parody of celebrity gossip mags like Heat and those 'Real Life' magazines like That's Life and Pick Me Up. When writing TMS - and just for reference this would have been 3-5 years ago now - I would occasionally feel I had gone a little overboard, and written something that was just too silly. The one about Anna's quest is a good example of one that just relies on silly made-up words to be funny.

But even that one seems believable when you see some of the stories that actually wind up in these magazines. In W.H. Smith's earlier I was glancing over a display when one, I think it was called 'It's Fate' or something like that, caught my eye. There were a few odd headlines, but I think my favourite was this one:

ONE-EYED SEAGULL POSSESSES MY WRONGED ENEMY'S SPIRIT

Now I feel like I was a bit too reliant on gritty realism.

Joel.   

Xander & A Solero Mocktail

Cliffey has his car back.

Remember this blog? Well disregard it, because Cliffey has his car back.

Sarah was working yesterday evening, and it wasn't hard to persuade Cliffey to drive to Next and pick her up at 7 (he was pretty excited just to be driving again). After a brief diversion involving some Penarth girls and waiting far too long to get served at Buffalo bar (although in all fairness their chips and that Solero mocktail thing were awesomatic), we decided to go to Sarah's house in Swanbridge and pick up the door that her dad had been keeping for Cliffey (he wants to make a dartboard stand or something, I don't know).

So we made the journey to Swanbridge, humming along to Klezmer Kollectiv all the while, but upon our arrival we encountered a problem: the door didn't really fit in the car.

We tried our best. Cliffey folded down seats, twisted and turned it but eventually admitted defeat.

But all was not in vain, for in addition for the lovely drive, we ended up going to Harvester afterwards.

We were very full afterwards. Good to have you back, Xander.

Joel.

Digimon Remains Totally Awesome

Three shifts this week, Monday Tuesday Wednesday. Each one a 7am start, so Thursday morning will be glorious. I mentioned to Sarah earlier that I might set my alarm for 5am on Thursday too, just so I'm awake to enjoy the fact that I don't have to get up.

So I just finished the first of those three shifts and today I was using the scanners, which are these little handheld gadgets that tell you whether that particular garment is going out on the shop floor or sticking around in the stock room. Basically I like it because it makes me feel like one of the DigiDestined.

This afternoon I will be attending to my other job, namely manager of Chester City FC in 2003. I'm a pretty mediocre football manager, but it still remains to be seen whether or not I'm better at working in a stockroom. 

At any rate, it's not all work work work. Yesterday Sarah and I relaxed by watching Michael Moore's record-breaking documentary Farenheit 9/11 (this actually kind of counted as revision for her, she's got a film exam on Wednesday and one of the questions is on documentaries). As it turns out, war and George W. Bush are both bad things.

It was good really.

Joel.

Dolphins: The Rapists of the Sea

Bristol was awesome, as 0o gy9fgujgkghkj

Let me try that again. Bristol was awesome, as Bristol always is, particularly on a day as sunny as today. I spent far too much money in Fopp, as I always do, particularly when I can actually kind of afford it.

However, given the Slutwalk that was happening in Cardiff today (not that I knew about that, I was in Bristol), I think I have a more relevant topic to discuss in today's entry.

Sarah and I went to my parents' house this evening to enjoy some dinner and chat, and not for the first time my acute fear of ostriches was brought to the table. I was, not for the first time, trying coolly to explain that it's a perfectly rational phobia and screw it I'm just going to quote WikiHow again:

"An ostrich attack...is straight out of Jurassic Park. Like that movie's velociraptors, ostriches are fast--they can run at up to 45 mph--and they have a sharp nail on each of their feet that is capable of slicing a person open with one kick. Unlike velociraptors, however, an ostrich can reach more than nine feet tall and 350 pounds."  

Anyway, I was trying to persuade everyone else of the above facts when my brother Nathan suggested that dolphins were a more sensible animal to fear than ostriches. Naturally we all disagreed, pointing out that dolphins rescue drowning humans and, in my mother's words, "swim with autistics", when Nathan shut us all up my claiming that dolphins are the only animals capable of rape.

Wow. We were momentarily stunned, but before long our juices started flowing again and we collectively remembered all the times that we've seen a boy pigeon trying to get his bone on with a girl pigeon who isn't that keen. And does that even count as rape? Can animals give consent?

Eventually we decided to disregard Nathan's theory, and having just had a look on the internet the evidence behind it seems pretty flimsy. I did, however, uncover this little gem on Wikipedia:

"Problems with encouraging pandas to mate in captivity have been very common. However, showing young male pandas 'panda pornography' is widely credited with a recent population boom among pandas in zoos."

How we laughed.

Joel.

P.S. Another thing we were discussing over our steaks was the kind of monastery (don't ask) populated entirely by monks keeping a vow of silence. When asked if they still existed, my dad replied "yes", and I added, "But they're very hush hush." I was embarrassed at the time but, in retrospect, I'm quite pleased with that.

Slow News Day

I have spent today in my pyjamas so I don't really have very much to say here at the moment. However, I promised an update every day so here are some pictures of baby seals:

Basically Sarah and I were playing Ludo earlier and there's a bunch of animals drawn all over the board and my favourite is the baby seal.

Joel.

WKD RNT

Now I know that for a lot of you readers this blog entry represents a mere five-minute respite between two humongous slabs of revision. I may have pointed out that I'm pretty much on summer holidays now because exams don't really enter into the equation for me, but as a show of solidarity I've come into uni anyway. Admittedly I'm just here to kill time and fuck about, but I hope you appreciate the gesture regardless.

At any rate, before I boot up Cubase 5 to compose some beatz, I've a topic to discuss with you all. On my way here, I passed a bus shelter advert for the new purple WKD, and in large, white capitals it posed the question, "IT'S NEW. IT'S WKD. IT'S PURPLE. WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE?"

Well, I don't have much else to report today - my yesterday evening mostly consisted of losing at Tetris - so I'm going to answer that question, thereby gunning the campaign down with my twin pistols of wit and exhaustive research.

IT'S NEW.

Is that always a good thing? Sure, new is exciting and shiny but behind that polished exterior lies disappointment and depression. Each new Pirates of the Caribbean film is worse than the last. Albums that come out nowadays are seldom as good as Attack of the Grey Lantern. And the best new chocolate bars to hit the shelves tend to be the ones that were already discontinued once and have been resurrected by tireless Facebook campaigns (and if everyone could get behind this one, that would be lovely, ta).

I'm popping down the shop in a bit, would you prefer a Wispa or a Spots v Stripes bar?

Exactly. New is crap.

IT'S WKD.

Back in my teetotal days, when even asking me to hold your drink would be met with a look of distinct mistrust, I was often told that WKD and other alcopops were a good place to start, alcohol-wise. They don't taste that much of actual alcohol, and this, presumably coupled with the fact that it comes in a squishy bottle, means that a lot of teenage girls start here before wading into heavier stuff.

Eventually I was talked into trying a sip or two of WKD, and lo and behold, it tasted...not great.

So between a mediocre flavour and the fact that it has probably introduced thousands of wide-eyed teenagers to binge drinking, I'm sure we can find something to hold against it. Like the name: 'WKD Original Vodka'. Really? Because I'm reliably informed by Wikipedia that:

"According to the Gin and Vodka Association (GVA), the first documented production of vodka...was in Russia in the late 9th century."

Hm. Let's check the WKD article:

"The drink was first marketed in Scotland under the name 'Wicked' and was launched in August 1996."

9th Century Russia...Scotland, Summer of '96. You decide which is the 'original' vodka.

IT'S PURPLE.

It's back to Wikipedia to tell us the problem there:

"In parts of East Asian countries such as Japan, purple is known as the color of death."

 Now obviously that's a cultural thing that doesn't really apply in the UK, but you know what else purple is associated with? Royalty. And let's see what unbiased social commentators Republic have to say about royalty:

"The monarchy is damaging to those caught up in it, it is unaccountable and it acts as a drag on our democratic process."

Much like WKD.

WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE?

Several things, as I feel I have shown rather thoroughly by now. In bullet point form, then:

• It's not something we've seen before, and as there was no Facebook campaign for the purple WKD I think we can all agree that there's no demand for it whatsoever.
• It claims to be vodka when it clearly isn't.
• WKD is basically responsible for the corruption of Britain's youths.
• If past form is to be believed, it probably doesn't taste that nice.
• Japanese people will associate it with death (think of the decline in tourism!)
• It's a "drag on our democratic process".

Also, am I the only one who finds it odd that the WKD adverts tend to be aimed at men aged 20-30 who clearly ought to be watching the football with a pint? Because that's completely the wrong target audience for an alcopop, surely.

The weather's nicer today, isn't it?

Joel.

June 1st

Today is the first of June, which means several things:

1. It's the first day of summer! Although the weather outside doesn't quite see it that way.
2. Thing #1 doesn't apply to any readers in the southern hemisphere, of course. For them, June is pretty much the equivalent of December, so I guess that today is also the first day of Advent. Pretty crazy, I know.
3. Speaking of the southern hemisphere, today is Samoan Independence Day. Samoans the world over (although admittedly the proceedings are probably most concentrated in Samoa) are celebrating their mother land's independence from those notorious dictators, New Zealand (boooo!).
4. May, a month in which I updated this blog an astoundingly poor 4 times - joint lowest with December, but even December had that huge entry with the 69 songs - is officially over, so for what feels like the umpteenth time I'm resolving to start writing here every day. Bet you're all really excited, huh?

There were several other reasons today was going to be a big day, including Cliffey getting Xander back from the garage and Gem moving out and Sarah and I moving into her ginormous master bedroom. However, Cliffey has not heard from the garage and I've got a feeling that Gem moves out on the first of July, not June, so it's looking like a fairly quiet day from our point of view.

Yesterday, by contrast, actually was pretty busy. I started work in the stockroom at Next, and did so adequately that those in charge saw fit to give me two extra shifts next week (that's a good thing...probably). Sarah, who started on Monday, is also doing well, and tomorrow she will be working a full eight-hour shift. 

Pundits have pretty much unanimously predicted an achy-legged Friday at Tewkesbury Place.

We also went to see We Are Scientists last night, and they were awesome, if somewhat pre-occupied with the fact that we'd just had a bank holiday weekend.

I'd barely noticed, although now I think about it I did spend the Monday eating zebra, snails, impala, and all manner of other things at Mark's birthday barbecue. 

So I guess I did celebrate it a bit. Happy Independence Day Samoa.

Joel.