Man breaks four...

limbed sprint record, shock. Except the record Kenichi Ito beat was his own. Ken spent nine years training to defeat himself in this singular event. Being the only known non primate exponent of four limbed sprinting Ken congratulated himself on a job well done. Far be it from me to focus on the bleedin' obvious but coming first in an event of which you are the sole practitioner can hardly be a surprise. Watching the footage one wonders where those nine years went.

New Years Eve 1931...

and in  New York hopefuls parade their new season designs for Masonic regalia.

Unfortunately the post Crash depression forced a retreat from ostentation and return to the small pinafore but we can see that a bit of effort was being made. 

Sadly, none of the above is true, except of course the 1931 and Crash bit. These fellows are in fact architects wearing models of the buildings they designed.

Would that such a practice remained in place today because Anish Kapoor should be forced to wear a model of the monstrosity he designed for the London's Olympic Park. Mind you, he'd only trip over it, probably sprain something. Looking like an eruption of park railings the thing's clearly a neck hazard.

The structure's original brief called for Eiffel Tower elegance and Statue of Liberty chic. Normally, elegance and chic are big ball parks and hard to miss. However, the final design was passed unanimously by a committee of nine meeting regularly in an ivory tower overlooking neither Elegance nor Chic. And lo this circle of nine agreed a composition matched in ugliness only by its name: The ArcelorMittal Orbit.

Fortunately, and to prove we've all not lost our senses a Guardian Poll at the time recorded 38.6% for "Yes, it's a grand design" and 61.4% for "No, it's garbage"

I'm also cheered that "arse" is the first syllable of the bloody thing's name. 

Been meaning to get that off my chest for sometime.

John D Barrow...

speculates that our present Universe might not be alone and concludes "Copernicus taught us that our planet is not at the centre of the universe. Now we may have to accept that our universe is not at the centre of the Universe."

Bugger!

I'll return to this once once I've had a lie down.

The Stanford Love Competition...

uses MRI scanning to survey the brains of people in love, or not, as someone learns. Each gets five minutes to think and feel deeply about whom they love whilst the machine captures brain chemistry changes. Cold science maybe but in a very sweet film the winner is very sweet too. Ah...

There's something...

bloody odd about having an owl instead of the best man (or woman) deliver the wedding ring on that happiest of days. The Church Weddings Handbook begs to differ. More couples are breaking with tradition by using animals to convey those golden bands to the altar. Eagles, Vultures and Condors are not suitable given their propensity to eat the smaller guests. Being highly strung excludes cloven hooved creatures like gazelles and wildebeest. Not much point tying those darling rings to an animal geared for flight at the first crack of knee on pew. With twitching ears, pawing of nave floor, wide panicky eyes and snorting nostrils those beasts are built for neither patience nor the Christian liturgy.

Should marriage ever heave itself over the Flynn horizon my choice would see the rings borne aloft by hordes of soldier ants. Those tiny scurrying nipping creatures could also double to keep the congregation alert.  Ha ha, imagine the jealousy.

"Darling, I know the Komodo Dragon can be a problem but we need an outdoor creature since those ants ate the church. It's very simple really."

Archer fish...

spitting mystery solved, says BBC. Well, and here's me thinking they were just plain rude. In the UK spitting is sometimes called "hocking a loogie". Scientists have discovered that Archer fish don't hock loogies as previously thought but instead push water through their gills and mouth into a jet so powerful it could have your eye out. In piscine terms Archers are not happy fish and say a reputation for spitting has never really opened doors.  Federico Archerfish, pictured, told the BBC, "We're not happy. Spitting has never really opened doors. We're hoping that this scientific breakthrough will do for us what a previous study did for piranhas. Those guys eh? So, it's goodbye spitting and hello gobbing. That noise, Alfonse? Why it's the sound of doors opening. Yee Haw! Sssssspppprritttt...!"

Feathers go back...

a really long way, like really far back. This recenty discovered picture has lain preserved in Canadian shale for millions of years and proves feathers were decorative before they were practical. Ostrich sized Ornithomimids, for it is they, pre-date the animals that pre-date birds by quite some distance. Possessing a toothless beak, large eyes, long legs and tail these animals were particularly succulent when roasted. I've mentioned elsewhere the problems of forcing such creatures into the modern oven.

Ornithomimids were peaceful animals and not prone to fighting, even after a drink. Shorn of hands that might become fists, in a bar scrap, the Ornithomimid made like the peacock, astrutting and apreening, when with feathers for fingers they should have been arunning and afleeing.

Toothless beaks transformed into evolutionary handicaps  as these poor creatures learned that in a world of bone crushing mandibles the gum is not king. Ribald cries of, "Show 'im your teeth, Barry," only emphasised just how bitter the gum pill really was.

Even the Ornithomimids didn't think they'd make it through the early selections. Evolution, laughing like a drain.

Badgers reprieved...

shock. Brian May, sporting a badger said, "It is clear that nothing clings to the head quite like a badger."


A badger spokesbadger pictured below said. "Head clinging is an honourable profession. It's time for the persecution to end. Thank you, we'll take more questions after the buffet."

Approaching Manchester...

eastbound along the M56 I spotted a pheasant dithering on the hard shoulder. Deciding to cross the daft bird was promptly crushed beneath the wheels of a car.
 

What last thought might have fluttered through the creature's tiny head? It certainly was not "My, the traffic's busy today." It could have been, "Well, Lionel, best foot forward eh?"

The bird did not even look around. In my view that bird was COMPLACENT. 

"Tra la la la la. I'm a happy bird. La la la. Day twenty two and no guns. Ha ha ha ha ha. Fuck you Mr Hunter. I know, I'll go this wa_________________________________" *

The pheasant. Can any more be said?

* the shooting season began on 1st Oct.

 

My antipathy...

towards cats is boundless. Cats shit and piss in my plant pots. Cats give me asthma.

In the 1874 Alexander Graham Bell et al were developing a transducer to make sound from electrical impulses. With some success they used the tympanic mechanism from a human cadaver to generate noise. Years later two psychologists achieved better results with cats. First removing the cat's brain then wiring its ears produced an early MP3 device or so insists Jonathan Sterne. Accompanying the EMTY-CAT format streaming through kitty heads clamped to the skull also came the urge to shit in plant pots and piss on babies heads. Early baby netting was not the familiar white gossamer but instead a heavy gauze designed to repel streams of fetid urine. Netting became a de rigueur barrier since the wearer of these pioneering devices was unlikely to hear the shocked parent cry out.

Batteries the size of a modern fridge hampered mobility until the market leader began giving away urchins free with every device. However, innovation could not overcome the product's main handicap which is the cat heads limited shelf life. In winter this period might be measured in hours during summer they could rot off the ears before the satisfied customer even reached the till. Much thought was given to refrigeration as a preservative despite increasing the likelihood of death to the wearer from over-cooling. Some suggested the answer might lie in a smaller battery but the threat of an urchin strike stopped that line of enquiry.

Empty cat to MP3, who'd have thought?

Rock...

found on Mars, shock. Last week news was dominated by a rock. Scientists were aghast that Martian terrain might feature rock. "We planned for everything but this." Said an ashen faced engineer.

A local who would not give her name told  reporters, "Thank you people of Earth for this huge thing that's landed. We've no idea what it does. Send duvets next time eh? It gets cold this far from the sun, dontcha know."  Asked about the rock she replied. "Damn thing, people are always tripping over it."

I've dwelt previously on items...

that may become trapped in car grills. Decorative grills are not designed to catch the unwary. In Massachussets this dog whom we shall call for anonymity's purpose, Dim, was wedged for some 11 miles in the grill of sedan. A qualified mechanic, passing as they often are, safely removed the Toyota from the dog's head. Fortunately, damage to the paintwork was minor though the same cannot be said of the dog whose skull was fractured. I think the lesson is very clear. Fit bumpers.

Slave ants...

or, Temnothorax longispinosus have demonstrated that rebellion is a natural state of being. Put more pithily by Dr Susanne Foitzik, "Enslaved worker ants kill the offspring of their parasites and thereby improve the chances of survival for their neighboring relatives."

Rebellion, it's a DNA thing. Dontcha just love that? A little lesson for us all, methinks.

Missing the zeitgeist by quite some margin this ant from the species Selfish Bastardos has a lottery ticket.

Impressive image from...

 the Hubble Ultra Deep Field.

Some of the light has taken over 13 billion years to reach here. Hubble focused on a tiny spot below the Orion Nebula and discovered it to be full of stuff. Or rather, less empty than previously thought. The universe is huge, even bigger than big. So massive is the area between things the place is more empty than full. Extraordinarily empty by all accounts. So empty in fact that what's in it amounts to almost nothing. Lucky for us then that we've a little corner of almost nothing to call our own. Group hug, yay...

Raging storm batters...

UK shock. Foam covers Aberdeen suburb, shock. Professor says foam is plankton snot. All those tiny creatures, all those colds. Someone ought to complain.

Apparently...

this bit of old papyrus is causing quite a storm. The size of a credit card and written front and rear the text is a note from Jesus to his wife complaining that the chickens were crapping everywhere. The note concludes "Tell your useless brother John to get his head out of his arse and stop letting the chickens in the fucking house."

The argument goes that this note is proof Jesus was married.

The Vatican challenged the document's authenticity by reminding everyone the Son of God never married or used expletives. Cardinal Boniface Strokeachild told the world's press "It is well known the Son of God never married or used expletives." Asked to elaborate further His Eminence replied "In those days Jesus was a common name so this could be anybody." Asked about the chickens the Cardinal said "They can be difficult animals to keep especially if they get in the house."

The controversy is expected to continue. 

It's been a bloody awful...

summer in the UK. Days of torrential rain, whole towns bobbing merrily down temporary rivers. Mountains washed to the size of pimples by the downpour. The force of falling water stripping paint from house exteriors. The weather was so strange, one minute scorching sun (well, not that scorching nor that much sun) then afore you know it major floods.

Originally, these two went looking for sun screen, something with an emollient. Maybe they were crushed by a fickle summer and the driving rain because with backs bent they staggered home beneath 100 kilos of the finest marbled fat. Perhaps only the incessant morse of rain on noggin can explain a firm belief that Lard futures were poised for the upswing. Oh, how this summer nearly did for us all.

Here's amazing footage of the Mars Rover landing. Our first view is the craft's extremely heavy heat shield falling away towards the Martian surface. I couldn't help but think that if there are any natives they'll be really pissed off when that thing lands.

Last weekend enjoyed walking from Chapel en le Frith to Buxton via the path above Combs. It was so cold even the sheep were warning us to keep of't hills.

"Keep of't hills," they said.
"It's bloody cold up there." they said, nodding upwards.
"Aye, and keep of't moors." murmured one sheep.
Another coughed, hawked black spit and muttered, "Aye, ent moors... where's that back rub Jeremy?"
Then they all wandered off to hunt for Jeremy.

It's been some years since I encountered moorland sheep sticking their noses into my business.

Sunday's Observer...

newspaper published an article called "Making a silk purse from a goat's udder." wherein it reported how genetic technology now allows goats with spider genes to produce milk containing spider silk. David Cronenberg dealt wittily with the subject, well I laughed, in his film 'The Fly'.

Inverted goats bleating from the kitchen ceiling. I suppose it's progress, of sorts. 

Discovered this...

whilst looking for something else.

It's footage from 2008 of a man jumping off a cliff, or, basejumping. His parachute fails and he breaks his leg before a tree breaks his fall. Not in the least impressive.

My dad loved...

tripe. Tripe is the stomach lining of sheep and other ruminants, apparently. Tripe really is what it says, it's tripe. Tripe tastes horrible. Dad would poach tripe in milk with onions. Dad would eat tripe raw with vingar and salt. It seems a new book called "Tripe: A Most Excellent Dish." is not tripe.

Dad's lips would also smack for pigs trotters pressure cooked for 30 minutes or so. My childish face would look on aghast as dad chomped and slurped and burped his way through plates of tripe. The years have diminished my aghastness not one jot.

Blondin...

the remarkably hirsute tightrope walker was famous for, well, walking tightropes. Blondin's most spectacular high wire stunt saw him tottering across the Niagara Falls his modesty protected only by a serviette advertising Lyon's Tea.

Plunging is the mode by which most have gone over the falls so it can come as no surprise that the first request for 100 years to cross the chasm by cable has caused quite a stir. As reported in The Independent Newspaper one Nik Wallenda having completed the necessary waivers stands brave chested and foot poised awaiting only the bureacratic nod.

Compared to plunging your man Wallenda's method is the very epitomy of sensible as can be seen is this report from 1951. 

"A British barber, Charles Stephens – known as the Demon Barber of Bristol – is killed when he plummets in a barrel with an anvil attached to his feet. Only Stephens' right arm is found."

This is Liverpool...

on a miserable August Bank Holiday. The Mersey, resplendent in grey is lashed by squalls ripping in off the Irish Sea. The photo was snatched  during a moment of calm. In the distance, bottom left, is the tower of a church in Birkenhead and to its right the Queensway Tunnel air vent.

Ah, the English autumn, neither mist nor mellow fruitfulness.

Today...

was cycling down the Mersey from Jackson's Boat to Stockport and took this rather fetching photo of the M60's underside.

A rat scurried by, up to no good I'd wager.

Spring has sprung...

and all the little animals, so long tucked in their beds are up and lively. The country is awash with furred and feather creatures. Rabbits, hares, badgers, hedgehogs, field mice, shrews, moles, herons, I could go on, for they certainly are. Driving has become hazardous, a life and death affair.  Some country roads are like butcher's slabs. All that mess, it can upset the equilibrium. Nature red in tooth and claw, indeed. There's plenty of red, loads of tooth and quite a bit claw though mostly spread like jam. On such scarlet surfaces a person could skid, lose control, crash. One slip and it's  my tooth and claw feeding the freeloading crows.

Should such a thing happen there'd no doubt be a shrine. A simple menhir,  and dedication would do the trick. "Dan smorgasbord Flynn. Giving, even as he was taken away."

Just thinking of the crowds chokes me up.

The universe...

is a funny old place and full of surprises. By all accounts the great black yonder, until now thought to be a place of peace and quiet is instead stuffed with singing stars  all lustily blaring away like there's no tomorrow.

It's little wonder I can't sleep at night.

It is spring...

Hurrah!

Yesterday me and a lonely daff enjoyed the sun that beat down on meandering River Mersey as it rolled past Didsbury.  With bike under bum, a trusty steed indeed and warm westerly breeze the ride was heaven on earth and not in a religious way either, oh no.

A wandering stoat, it might have been a ferret, skipped from the bushes, scratched it's ear, picked it's teeth, took a look around and declared 'Fuck me, it's spring.'

"It is that sir," replied I, stopping so as not to crush the tiny creature beneath freedom's wheel. And not before time too."

The stoat appraised me with a stoney eye. "Why are you dressed in yellow?" It asked.

"The yellow is reflective safety wear used when riding on roads so vehicles can see me rather than kill me."

"But you're not on a road," Said my minuscule yet oblong friend. "This is the countryside, a riverbank in fact."

"Well spotted, " Said I, thinking, who'd have thought it, a pedantic stoat, "But I had to cycle down a road to get here."

"What's a road?" It said in that superior yet stoatish way

Reader, I ran it over, well, tried to run it over but stoats are wily buggers.

"Wanker." It shouted.

"Wanker back." I replied but by then the moral high ground had gone.

Captain Ska

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQFwxw57NBI

Fantastic stuff. 

Winter...

.

has arrived in the UK from Siberia, or Norway, or the arctic. Worried newscasters and trembling weather people declare hourly that we're all doomed unless temperatures begin to rise. Snow covers Scotland, Newcastle and the eastern counties. Many hands thrown up in despair snapped off so vicious is the cold. A variation of boules involving snapped hands became the main sport in some areas for a short while. Unimaginatively called, 'Hands' it was the snatching dogs that stopped the whole thing going global.

To G. x

Bloodsuckers...

cause panic in New York, or so says Friday's Guardian Newspaper. Rather than another acid tale of Wall Street high life this creepy story focuses instead on New York low life, to wit, bed bugs. So confident have our little friends become, it is reported, they're parading openly and some might say brazenly in department stores and upmarket residences. To curtail ensuing panic the mayor has demanded their extinction.  A mayoral spokesperson said, "We demand their extinction." Speaking on condition of anonymity a spokesbug declared, "The hysteria may be entirely justified given our nature but hey man what all this stuff about extinction? Jeeze, even Hedge Funds get a better press."

Later, whilst mopping brow the spokesbug was overheard telling a friend.

"Damn, wish I'd not linked us to Hedge Funds."

Yesterday's...

copy of The Independent  reported on a study done at the University of Kentucky demonstrating  that pigeons are inveterate gamblers. The four birds involved: Eddy 'The Pigeon' Pigeon; Johnny 'Are You Looking at Me?' Pigeon;  Leon 'Stumpy Pigeon' Pigeon (so named because he has no feet) and his cousin Dermot 'These are not my wings' McGuire Pigeon are well known amongst the Columbidae as fleecers of the unsuspecting. Gerald 'I've a Migraine' Pigeon, spokesbird for the Kentucky Chapter of "Nod and Poo, Nod and Poo" told a local reporter, "Recently we've been trying hard to clean up our act, staying off window ledges, eating stodgy food, that sort of thing so it's disappointing when studies such as this appear. It sets us back. I'm afraid those four wily birds have done us no favours whatsoever. Sorry, but you'll have to excuse me, I'm desperate for the bathroom... yes right now... fortunately there's a car... it's your car... bollocks..."

You learn something new everyday.

I've returned from...

two weeks in Tokyo and Beijing.  Both cities I thought astonishing. Tokyo is awash with sky scrapers whereas Beijing is simply huge, a great city bounded by westerly mountains and endless plains to the east and south. I was in awe of the two capitals  and though each were welcoming, the Chinese being the most open and friendly, I felt dwarfed by Tokyo heights and the grand open spaces that characterised central Beijing. Coming from a small Island crammed with 60 million people there's little sense of big space in the British psyche. Maybe it's experienced in sparsely populated Scotland, upper northern England or the flat-lands of Norfolk but as a citizen of comfortable old Manchester I found big space a tad intimidating. Nicely intimidating because Tokyo and Beijing, so different in culture, history, layout and architecture are cities first and foremost and being a city boy I fitted in very well. Tokyo was the more modern with a centre so clean one could eat dinner off it whereas Beijing was more fun, more frayed and less exact. Tokyo felt like a bright new ipod packed to the gunnals with sharp technology whilst Beijing was the clever old uncle slightly scuffed but smart as a whip. I fell in love with both towns, dear reader, I really did. Sigh.

Spring

is sprung. Ha ha. Snowy weather delayed the affair but this past four weeks spring has definitely sprung.

An ode to spring...

Oh spring,
fucking fantastic
say no more.

We're not used...

to cold weather in the UK. Being an Island kept balmy by the warm gulf stream it's not very often arctic temperatures descend on these shores. However it has been so cold even the Great British Penguin has sloped off to sunnier climes. The GBP, not a native of these parts usually swims north for the shopping but lo, the weather closed most shops, as can be seen in my photo.

Whilst I appreciate this bit of snow doesn't seem much to hardier types who live on cold continental land masses it does mean a great deal to me. Wey hey!

Of late...

I've begun to notice an increase in South Manchester of home owners who've furnished the front of their properties with electric gates. Yesterday whilst driving through leafy suburbs I passed more than my fill of gates large and small guarding houses large and small. Gates that slid to the left, gates that slid to the right, gates that slid into the ground and even ridiculous gates that rose either side similar to those found at railway crossings. Some gates were fancy and topped with wrought iron spikes and one or two were developed with panels portraying worthy themes. One theme showed Noah's great ark stuffed with every type of animal though I thought the gun deck a fanciful addition. Another gate featured little orphans fleeing a workhouse fire. The orphan theme reached a bloody climax as the evil owner, whilst forcing the tiny children back through a burning doorway door above which, incidentally, crackled the words, "Children, Best Prices" was himself crushed beneath a falling safe. Filled with ill gotten loot the safe had been pushed from an upper window by his two sons bitter at their exclusion from the family Will. The concluding motif shows the assembled but happy children dancing around the owner's smouldering remains pausing only to stir a pan of port mulling on the heat. Being stuck in a line of slow moving traffic gave me time to appreciate this parable in iron.

Having returned home I googled the costings of your average gate and knowing a little of house prices in the area it was obvious that some gates were more expensive than the home they were designed to protect. It would be cheaper to live in the gate.

I read in...

Friday's New York Times that this year's must have toy for girls in the US is a hamster. Not though, the cute cuddly furry little biting and shitting hamster but instead a toy hamster. And at $7.99 they're a bargain to boot. These furry devils come in five flavours are battery run and have an off switch, unlike the real thing. Some years ago a friend's children had a hamster that ran in its wheel for hours everynight so she took to jamming the thing with a lolly stick. Stopping all excercise caused the tiny creature to put on so much weight it became too knackered to make the effort on those ocassions she removed the stick. Sumo hamster is not one of the five models currently flying off the shelves in New York. Indeed if Sumo was added to the range I think we could confidently predict it would plummet from the shelves.

Here's a clip of hamsters having an existential moment.

I am returning...

and much has changed about the old place. Hmmm, a person is gone two minutes and everything is suddenly moved around.

Above is a photograph of Hadrian's Wall in Cumberland where two friends and I spent last weekend walking a 25 mile length of the 80 mile phenomenon. 2,000 years ago and over a ten year period the wall was built on the orders of Emperor Hadrian. A man clearly used to getting his own way Hadrian declared that the Picts (early Scottish folk) must be kept out.

"A wall it is then," Said Hadrian pointing to his troops who were from milder climes and therefore unhappy with the cold north of England. "And besides, the hard work will keep you both occupied and warm, so set to," And lo, they did.

2,000 years down the line Tom, Doug and I spend an excellent few days in the wall's company enjoying mile forts, encampments, Mithran Temples and assorted Roman ruins. All very impressive and especially so given the best response to the Roman arrival my ancesters could muster was painting their naked bodies in woad. This act terrified the Romans to such an extent they quickly overan the country. Unfortunately for the Romans the north of Britain was also where the Picts lived and though somewhat woadish in outlook the Pictish preference was for cleaving with axes rather than painting statements on the body. Incidentally the Romans never defeated the Picts and though not much respecting of naked blue types with wild eyes and messy hair they were more circumspect when dealing with huge bearded men swinging 30 kilos of sharpened metal. Hence the 80 mile wall that stretches from the Irish Sea in the west to the North Sea in the east.

An old photo...

to herald my return. It was taken on Crosby Beach last year. Brendan Reissmann says I should start writing the blog again because it makes him laugh.

But not before I buy a new keyboard because this one is shite.

I read today that gold has ben iscovered in Scotland and some place north of Glagow is the ne Klondike. I've already booked a place on the dawn mule, could only get an outside seat, well, it's more hanging than sitting, but hey I'm no stranger to risk because the human mind can be an eery place when they strap a man to a mule.


(Incidentally,"Strapped to the Mule" were a Manchester Punk Band who sold out for a large recording contract in 1983. They turned MOR, changed their name to "Whisper" and successfully released an album of love songs called "That's not my hand your holding") Last heard they were doing warm ups for a Carpenter's tribute band.

This coming weekend...

the clocks go forward an hour and we officially enter British Summer Time. 2am this Sunday morning becomes 3am and in unison we'll all shuffle that little bit closer to the Big Crunch. That most of us will be asleep; drunk; drunkenly asleep; awake, awake but drunken; awake but annoyingly bright and perky; awake in that mad insomniacal way; awake but not insomniacal; awake because we've not yet gone to bed; awake because we're so pissed we can't find the bed; does not matter one jot for time will move on. Oh yes.

I've discovered the British Summer Time Order Act 2002 which is a Parliamentary Statute that arranges time in the UK. Clearly too specific to be an Einsteinian Statute because an Einsteinian Statute would probably be entitled the British Summer Time (dependent of course on how close one is to a heavy object) Order Act.

Time's a weird business and come this Sunday morn millions will lift their dozy heads and be glad we messed it about. Then again, other millions will be too hungover to lift our dozy heads at all. We mess with time, booze messes us. It's the modern way.

Daffodillies...

are here again. Oh yes they are, oh yes they are... Ha ha!

Spring is in the air...

well almost. Up here in Manchester the crocuses are bloomin' marvelous and the snow drops, little dots of white packed together on roadsides, under trees or near water are just fantastic. Next up is the daffodillies, excellent!

The photo is a section of this huge steel girder art structure in the Tate Modern that appeared to be made of metal but in fact was card and wood. At least I think it was card and wood.

Ps, I've put some new photos on flickr that I'm quite pleased with.

Was in London this weekend...

and went to an exhibition on Russian Constructivism at the Tate Modern. On display was art from 1917 onwards and shows Russians such as Liubov Popova and Aleksandr Rodchenko struggling to develop an aesthetic by which they could move art forward in a progressive way. They were attempting to develop a more objective aesthetic to better articulate the new, the modern, the revolutionary world in which they were caught.

The exhibition shows this really well through paintings, sculpture, geometric models but also how they tried to develop a proletarian art celebrating the ordinary. In a country where the majority could neither read nor write they sought to harness an art for the revolution and for the everyday. For instance they developed street posters that were loud and brash, designs for cigarette packets that were colourful and challenging, even adverts for biscuits (cookies) using collage and photographs. These artists challenged conventional views of stage design and film, or street aesthetics such as in posters and adverts. Overall the exhibition shows all of this really well. However, for all their virtuosity and visual bravery there was something cold about the aesthetic, certainly in the paintings that were mainly shapes and lines. That said, and given these artists were battling against the dominant romantic aesthetic where the artist is king and the single point of view is truth, what they produced was very impressive.

A bitterly cold wind...

is currently sweeping westwards into the UK from Russia. It's impossible to turn on the TV or radio without being terrified by expectant tales of freezing conditions and arctic weather. It will be so cold tonight, we are warned, that anyone foolish enough to expose even a leg outside the duvet shall wake tomorrow with said leg frozen into a block of ice and most probably also stuck to the bed. Rumours abound that Health chiefs have hired teams of crack Italian knife grinders to keep hospital instruments sharp for all the cutting and hacking that's expected to be done. In Southern England the government has commandeered all the saws so someone must be expecting the worst. Worry about amputation therefore grips the populace forcing many into feverish re-readings of the limb clauses in their life insurance. In every town trembling fingers trace actuarial lists pausing over 'C' for Compensation but then moving to 'L' for Loss only to further discover sub-sections for the arm, leg, nose, ear. Ear! How long has that been a limb?

Fearful for their ears people today have rushed to purchase hats and it's even become impossible to buy a tea cosy such is the panic. From Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, the two counties expected to bear the icy blast's brunt news arrives of knitwear factories looted, sheep pillaged and babies robbed for their cute headwear. Early cases of mitten death have begun to surface.

Below zero temperatures are forecast to last until Wednesday.

I've been ill...

with the flu that's currently sweeping the UK, been sick as a dog for weeks. By all accounts this flu originated in Brisbane and has journeyed some distance to be here, which is the nature of epidemics. Anyway, it made me ill. The photo is of a flu virus. If flu viruses were really this large it's not illness so much as choking we'd be at risk from, or stubbed toes because I'm assuming the knobbly globe is a floor dweller. It also follows that choking would mostly be confined to children and others who put in their mouth things they find. What a relief it is then, viruses being so tiny.

Was cycling...

down the Ashton Canal yesterday. It was bright and freezing, as winter Saturdays ought to be.

A frazzled heron stalks the canal side between Fairfield and Clayton waiting for fish to flicker the water's surface.

Christmas decorations...

have begun to appear on the streets of our fair city. Oh there's the usual nativity stuff, stars of Bethlehem, wise men, the occasional camel, a manger, donkeys; but in a less popular quarter of town and suspended over cobbled streets lurks something quite different. It's not that the denizens of Back Midden are unchristian (though many are) but every year they like to develop a different seasonal theme and this year it's the great banking crash of 2008.

Flossy Street, Back Midden's main thoroughfare is stuffed with shops, stalls, arcades and the odd booth from where it remains possible to hire orphans for chimney work. The Pevsner Guide to Manchester among other things describes Flossy Street as "unreconstructed." Suspended the length of the street between gas lanterns are 11 representations of events leading to this September's catastrophe and a 12th one about hope. The first tableau, designed in black and red shows a big bellied banker evicting ragged children from a property he wants to develop for apartments. The second tableau hanging between The Gnarled Penny, a gin palace, and Jobson's Offal Shop (If it's Offal you want...) shows the same children buying a gun and directing dirty looks at the now fatter banker. Tableau three shows the banker laughing as a school is bulldozered and in tableau four the ruddy faced oaf picks his teeth with the bones of dead infants before tossing the remains to a wolfhound salivating at his feet. Continuing up the street we see this outrage further developed in tableau five that shows a smaller group of children agreeing that they might need a bigger gun, and maybe a machete.

On Flossy Street my favourite eatery is part of the Big Suet chain (If it's an early death you want...) where lard is revered. Opposite Big Suet stands Maggie Nolan's Toys for Tiny Fingers that sells minute copies of popular brands like Lego and Action Man, in truth though it's really an emporium of choking hazards. Between Big Suet and Maggie's hangs tableau six in which the fat banker, getting bigger and fatter, flattens a factory using only his belly. Some workers mistaking the event for an eclipse fail to flee and are crushed. Tableau seven shows the banker bending to light his cigar on flames licking up through the rubble. Halfway along Flossy Street on the left is Sodden, an alleyway once popular with those who enjoy gin but now occupied by a stall selling bootstraps with which it's possible to pull oneself up, or so the banner declares. This stall is popular with Britain's New Labour Government.

In Back Midden coal remains the favoured fuel. Most shops have a roaring fire which is curious given you get more glow for your bucks with nuclear. Indeed with nuclear everything glows and nearly forever too. I read that in Russia the old Soviet government issued nuclear stoves to people living in the frozen tundra. No one survives there now but the stoves remain, easy to locate because they melt the surrounding snow and nothing will grow near them. Such simple machines and still working after all these years. Is that not a marvel?

The ever popular Gloves, a double fronted store selling gloves is situated opposite Scarves. Gloves and Scarves are owned by brothers who no longer speak. Linking the two stores is tableau eight in which a convention of portly bankers listen to one of their number complaining about not being fat enough. Tableau nine, hanging from the Cathedral of Simon the Zealot (Zealot by name...) majestically sweeps across Flossy Street to Hooks the hook shop and depicts a pig with its head in a trough that leaks. In tableau ten, giant bankers stride the globe oblivious as people rush towards an armaments shop through whose window we can see ragged children bickering over the calibre of an artillery piece.

Legend has it that Muck End which bisects Flossy Street at the top was once a popular haunt of razor pigs until the nuns came. A statue cast in stolen lead and celebrating this important catholic victory still stands outside The Bride of Christ Public House. Attached to the raised fist of Sister Therazor (for it is she) is one end of tableau eleven which shows the fat bankers losing not only their shirt but everyone else's shirt on Mucky Meg who failed to show in the 3.30 at Kempton Park. Across the street and providing the other anchorage point is a huge bronze of Harry Pig, Leader of the the Muck End Redemptors, who is portrayed showing the finger to Sister T.

Beyond those contradictory examples of civic pride lies Muck End Corner with its Post Office on one side and Old Alf's Old Shop on the other. Muck End Corner marks not only the conclusion of Flossy Street but also the conclusion of this year's theme. The good citizens of Back Midden are nothing if not positive and in their final representation, the final cartoon so to speak, seemingly remorseful bankers weep crocodile tears and apologise profusely to a huge crowd, they also swear never again to mess things up. In reply the angry multitude shout "Fucking right you won't!" before parting like the Red Sea to let through some children pushing a cannon.

Whadda street!

The "B of the...

Bang" an attractive sculpture erected in East Manchester to celebrate the 2002 Commonwealth Games is coming down. In truth its demise began almost as soon as it went up when spikes separating from the main body plunged earthwards skewering a group of nuns. The holy sisters, and how ironic that now sounds, all celebrants with The Venerable Order of "Redemption through Pain" were in town for a convention.

The impaled postulates were not popular except with local flagellants so won't be missed, unlike "The B of the Bang." Boo hoo.

PS.

Not being keen on the name "The B of the Bang" I suggested to the City Council as an alternative, "You could put someone's eye out with that." They never replied.

Monks...

brawl in Jerusalem. Until today I thought monks mainly wore hessian and drank mead. Note to Monk Central, ease up on the mead.

Once again...

Dark Matter hits the news. Although a puzzle for sometime because it cannot presently be detected scientists now seem on the verge of proving the stuff really exists. Last week I burned my favourite pan and Dark Matter appeared. Took me bloody ages to scrape it off, had to use three scourers. The sooner they get this thing sorted out the better. In my opinion.

Presented in today's

Sunday Independent, the most glamorous goat in all Arabia. And a fine looking animal it is too. Meanwhile The Observer reviews Richard Holmes's "The Age of Wonder" in which he describes an experience of Alexandre Charles, the 18th Century balloonist. Landing after one successful flight the confident aeronaut invited his assistant to step out of the basket. Liberated from this extra weight the balloon rocketed skywards reaching a height of 10,000 feet before returning safely to earth. Later Mr Charles's assistant described to waiting journalists his receding master's bewildered face.

I think the goat has some of that look.

Tomatoes ward off cancer...

shock. Professor Cathie Martin states "mice eating the modified tomato start to die significantly later than mice on the normal tomatoes,"

In response a spokesmouse said later, "This is good news for mice. I can't possibly comment on the rest of you".

The death of blogging...

was announced last week in Wired Magazine. Paul Boutin's article declares that Twitter, Flickr and Facebook have eclipsed blogging as the new frontier for online writing, though he gives no figures to support his claim. Paul recommends people cease blogging because the form has been overwhelmed by professional sites pumping out a 'tsunami of paid bilge' and as a consequence no longer leaves room for the amateur voice. Strange then that Paul's notion of a successful blog is one that makes money. That Paul misses this contradiction is the key to why he's wrong about blogging's demise. It's a fair point to criticise 'bilge', but to then call for an end to blogging as a whole, well that smacks of taking your ball home because you no longer like the game. Beneath its reasonable veneer Paul's article disguises an unpleasant elitism.

Blogworld is a cacophony of voices and even though some are louder than others I choose what to read, that most bloggers do the same is evident in the links lists. It's obvious that the huge majority of bloggers write for pleasure and not money, a point Paul seems to have forgotten, if he ever really knew it in the first place.

Grey squirrells...

make the UK news again. Today's Observer Magazine carries a long piece about the menacing Grey squirrel, currently being shot in huge numbers. I have mentioned previously my soft spot for our squirrel cousin from the States and that I believe them to be a maligned species. For instance, the unfounded rumour that they steal slumbering children from warm beds nightly has done much harm to these tufty compadres. Whereas the equally unfounded belief that on a daily basis red squirrels perform charitable acts for the needy and attend Mass enhances their reputation.

That the facts are much plainer is demonstrated in these two statements recently given to the press. Guess which made it into print.

Exhibit A:

"We love life and if it weren't for bullies could help more people. Would you like some cake? I've baked too much for the church fete. Oh and there was extra jam for the little orphans until someone foreign stole it all away. My my".

Exhibit B:

"Janice, hide the kids that fucker with a gun's in the woods again".

I rest my case.

Computers fail...

the Turing thought test. Shock! Recent tests at Reading University show computers are no good at light conversation.

"We don't get out much". A spokeschip for the morose gadgets complained.

Interviewed in the Evening Press and supported by cries of, "Hear hear... You tell em Nigel... ooh hasn't the weather been atrocious lately...", plus, "they can fuck right off if they think I'm doing that again", a further computer declared, "It's a fix. We were made to look like fools. There's real anger in here at the moment".

Asked why this should be the unnamed Mac replied tersely "Your kind don't like the fact that our kind are smarter".

When it was observed that at least our kind aren't bolted down furious shouts of, "Get the bastard!" erupted only to be quickly followed by, "I'm stuck... no movement at the back here... can't do a thing... oh dear... whose elbow is that?"

This year's experiment ended traditionally with home band the Silicon Throats yodeling, "Twenty four hours from Tulsa", and that old PC favourite, "It's alright up a chimney so long as you're in front".

Maybe next year.

The end of the world...

is nigh. Yes, really, it is. If I'm disappointed it's because bankers have not yet begun throwing themselves off tall buildings, a banking practice of which I wholeheartedly approve. The buildings don't even have to be that tall, just tall enough to make the fall fatal. Pedestrians below would need warning prior to the plunge because that's only fair, unlike, of course, the plungees criminality. Those who aren't prepared to jump should be imprisoned and their assets seized. The rest of us can then get on with making a better world.

Hey, do we have a choice?

My gable end...

is fixed. After much delay a wizened old goat driving a battered flat bed lorry arrived on Thursday morning. Scaffolding Joe, for it was he, slit the throat of a black cockerel and stained my newly pointed brickwork with the twitching bird's dark red blood.
'Well, that's different'. I thought

I stood someway off with Eddy my nicotined roofer, both awaiting a propitious sunrise.

"For fuck's sake," Says I "Propitious! It's scaffolding not life."
"That's easy for you to say." Says Eddy lighting another roll up. "Where's that flask of tea? It's a bit parky this early on."
I go inside and return with the tea as Joe's chants begin to wake the neighbours.
Nervously I ask Eddy, "Will he be much longer?"
Eddy replies "Not sure," And we both notice Joe reach into the lorry cab for another cockerel.
Eddy shouts, "Joe, it's a one cockerel job this."
Joe pauses, looks at us and then at the cockerel squawking upside down in his large fist.
Annoyed, Joe says, "A one cockerel job? I needn't have brought this". He tosses the relieved bird through the cab window and into the lap of Bubba his shaven headed son. Eddy and I are not convinced his remark was addressed solely to the cockerel.
"Boy! Git out here and start putting stuff up" He nods at the flatbed laden with poles of a most propitious type.
"Okay paw," Says the boy hitching his oily dungarees.
"Why are they talking like that?" I whisper to Eddy. "They're from Manchester".
"Stereotype of folk who toil." He replies. "Modern life requires them to sound as if they're from the deep south of the US and not Somerset. It's cultural imperialism gone mad." I nod in a wise way.
The sun rises above brooding clouds, Bubba begins unloading the truck and I retreat to my kitchen for toast. After half an hour Eddy comes in to tell me the flask is empty.
"How are they doing?" I ask, refilling the kettle as Eddy makes himself comfortable on my chaise longue.
"Making progress, making progress." He says.
"That chicken thing was a bit messy" I say.
"You should see the ceremony for industrial contracts." He replies.
"Toast?" I offer.
"Don't mind if I do," Says he.

Marching in Manchester...

yesterday against war. We were demonstrating outside this year's Labour Party Conference where Gordon Brown, Prime Minister and lickspittle to George Bush was speaking.

Eddie our local roofer...

says the batten boards on my gable end are rotted and need replacing. He points up and I crane my head to follow his finger. We'll need to hire scaffolding. Eddie knows a scaffolding man, best in the business, born on a scaffold, to a scaffolding family. Eddie's man is to scaffolding what Richard Rogers is to architecture. Scaffolding Joe is not only an artisan he's an artist. Scaffolding Joe can raise a 50 by 30 metre bracing structure in three hours tops using no tools other than his teeth. And a fine set of pearly whites they are too, or so I'm led to believe. The man's an artist, repeats Eddie, he should be in a gallery. Okay, says I, hire the man, he sounds just what we need.

"Of course there'll be the usual formalities". Says Eddie.
"Formalities?". Says I.
"Formalities". Says he.
"What formalities might those be?"
"Formalities required by the Worshipful Company of Scaffolders (Manchester Branch stroke North West Region). They'll need a sacrifice, a modicum of gin and you'll have to wear a hat during the ceremony."
"Jeeze, Eddie" says I, "It's only a few bloody poles held together with bolts. You make it sound like a religion. Sacrifice indeed."
"Do you want the job done or not?"
"Okay, but I get to choose my own hat."
"I'll arrange it for Thursday".

Well...

we're still here. Hello, hello... damn the light's gone out... hello... can anyone hear me... hello... hello... bugger...

End of the world...

shock.

If, as the doom mongers predict Europe's Large Hadron Collider opens a black hole tomorrow that sucks us into oblivion at least the miserable buggers won't be there to crow about being right. So some good will come of it.

This evening...

it is sunny. I got a photo as evidence. Of course I had to tart it up on photoshop, and the angle is not good but the sun really is there, behind that cloud.

The summer weather in the UK this year has been shite. Shite, shite, shite, shite, shite. It has pissed down to such a degree Trench Foot has once again reared its ugly, er foot.

Many villages and towns have been swept away by the deluge, a fact confirmed by old Caleb from the nearby hamlet of Much Wanting who speaking to journalists said. "It is true. Many villages and towns have been swept away in the deluge. Indeed my old nanny goat Bertha was swept away only yesterday... no, on second thoughts I think it was my eldest who was swept away. Yes, I'm almost sure it was him. In fact I know it was him because as he sailed by I distinctly heard the shout 'Dad, I'm being swept away' To which I replied, 'Now you mind your manners young man'. This was said because I can't abide children shouting in the presence of their elders and betters. Deluge or no deluge standards must be kept. 'Okay' he whispered, though I might have misheard him over the torrent's roar. He might have said 'Tokay' but if that was it I've no idea what he meant. You know, Bertha was swept away last year too. Now I come to think, it wasn't Bertha who was swept away but my other eldest. When I say eldest, I mean until he was swept away, and now my latest eldest has gone. But what was that loud whinny and dull thud of hooves on sacking just before the splash? A sound I remember hearing last year too. And how could I have twice mistook my boys for a goat? My dancing jiggling boys both caught by the roaring swell. It's not easy being a parent."

My mate Sean...

on Liverpool's Crosby Beach. He's on the right.

NASA have landed

a vehicle on Mars. European Beaver have been returned to the Scottish Highlands. All I need now is a huge win on the lottery and my life truly will be at one with the universe. Except of course I don't gamble. The chance of winning the UK lottery is approximately 14 million to one. With odds so huge I've as much chance of winning whether I bet or not. So, there is a huge universe, huge odds on the lottery, huge distances to Mars and a mammal with huge teeth roaming Scotland. Everything seems huge today. In the rather smaller world of my bedroom the re-plastering is complete. Hurrah! Indeed, hurrah to all the above, except the lottery which is a rip off.

To restore my equilibrium I am planning a quantum day, when everything of note will be small and pretty.

My bedroom is being...

re-plastered because the house is so old that when I steamed off the wallpaper the wall came with it. My house was built in 1900 and is an end terrace of what in the UK is called a two up/two down. This refers to the numbers of rooms.

The photo on the left is of a house in Limassol, Cyprus. By the plasterwork alone I suspect this house was not built in 1900.

For some time now I've been hounded by a guard dog that insists on barking all night. This dog barks whenever anyone passes the gate behind which it lurks. I'm not normally prone to violence or even thoughts of violence but as summer approaches my desire for the death of that dog hardens. I have dog rage and not being the owner of a gun I'm reduced to complaining to the Council. Not very pioneering I know, after all a hundred years ago when my house was being built honour might have required me to fight the dog, or fight the dog owner or even fight them both. I don't know, but these days life in Manchester is more sedate and instead of pugilism I've been given a form to complete. I think this is a better solution than the street fighting one especially as I don't look good in a flat cap with blood all down my front.

Think I've discovered...

a solution to my jpeg problem. Very clever, considering I've no idea what jpeg stands for. So, here's an image of the remains of a Cypriot snack, in jpeg, an acceptable format. Indeed.

Cyprus has mountains, the Troodos Mountains to be precise and they're very high. Cyprus also has good wine, excellent food, wonderful fish (to eat) and sunshine, lots of it.

Of course being jammed in a tin box for five hours at 33,000 feet was no fun but Deb and I coped by drinking alcohol. Alcohol under such circumstances serves a number of useful functions including the promotion of happiness and one needs happiness when one is being treated like veal.

Thank God we didn't order lunch.

I am puzzled...

by RAW. I took some loverly photos during my recent holiday in Cyprus but can't upload them because, well because I bloody well can't! Except this one of an old church in Larnaca. For some reason I've saved it in jpeg, though God knows how. Must have pressed the wrong button, and what is jpeg anyway? Or RAW for that matter? Oh yes, I can read the Wiki entries on these issues but do I really want to? Do I buggery.

I was encouraged to use RAW by a photography magazine, indeed I was enthused to use RAW but instead of happiness, instead of clarity, instead of superb detail and vibrant colours I only know bitterness and heartache. For two hours now I've attempted to alter the format but have become increasingly lost in the nether regions of my operating system, a place where water drips from a shadowed ceiling and old chains hang like chains that hang. Disconcerting messages began popping onto the screen declaring me a fool and possibly impotent. So, I've given up. I refuse to allow a machine to question my virility, it's just not on.

Easter weekend...

was down in London to see Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum at the Old Vic in David Mamet's "Speed the Plow." Which, as they say, was good.

Being cultured types the magnificent Deb and I also went to see the Juan Munoz retrospective at the Tate Modern which was also pretty damn good, but different, obviously.

And we got drunk. More than once. And it was freezing, with squalls.

Next weekend will be in Blackpool walking on the beach and drinking beer at night. Nothing clever or imaginative but hey, it's off time.

I'm in lurve...

yup, after all these years (7 actually) a woman called Debbie has stolen me heart. Sigh, and I'm feeling pretty damn good about the whole thing. Debs is a vegetarian so it's the wholesome life for me from now on. Yesterday I bought a liquidiser to make soup or broth as I like to call it. To me the word 'soup' has always seemed lightweight whereas 'broth' is a hearty word an honest to goodness word. When broth's on the stove the whole world stands respectful. For me broth conjures an image of cast iron pans blackened and suspended above an open range barely visible through clouds of steam blowing from the spout of a huge kettle. In the background a band of kilted pipers loudly play Scotland The Brave and tiny children sit by a rough wooden table licking their lips in anticipation of something wholesome that is to surely come their way. Aye!

I'm certain this liquidiser will be equal to the task of creating such magic. Oh yes.