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.