Tuesday, November 30, 2004

Ex - X : Some Bridges SHOULD be burnt

So X sent me this message in an email thread which I didn't start, and didn't want.

"Well, you'd be thriving better if you hadn't broken up with me"

The pompous, conceited, selfish, egocentric whore. I've barely tolerated keeping in touch with him since we broke up 18 months ago. And I learned in my early twenties of the rule, "Don't Burn your Bridges". But damn, some bridges should be blasted to smithereens and replaced by arsenals of nuclear warheads.

He found this blog in August, much to my consternation, but I really don't care anymore. I had already decided back in May, that enough of my life was wasted on him.

So that's the last email from him I'm ever reading. I've never used the Blocked Senders feature on Outlook Express till now.

You get to choose your friends, and it's a shame you can't choose your Ex's, but you can block them out of existence. He'll be fine. He has the entire counselling profession to run to, when he isn't charging other people £30 an hour for the privilege of his arrogance and ignorance. Don't ever, ever marry a counsellor.

Sunday, November 28, 2004

State Visit weekend and Piano-moving Day

Winter lasts 91 days and began around the 6th November (refer). So there are only 48 more days of winter to come that will be worse than now. Encouraging.

And I had R and his partner up from Somerset staying with me this weekend. It kept me busy all week, as I strove to get on with the mess in this house in preparation for their State Visit. It was a very productive week: I had no reason to be depressed. I got things done, but of course I still didn't get as much done as expected. I had to resort to opening up the sofabed downstairs to accommodate them, since the spare bedroom was unfinished. The foam mattress in the sofabed had not been opened out for over 5 years, and I think it has been squashed into permanent and useless disfigurement.

We headed into town last night, stopped to look at the beautifully lit courtyard of Somerset house with its skating rink (which could do with being bigger), then had a bite to eat in Chinatown. The West End was heaving with tourists. I have not seen Central London so busy since before 9/11. In Covent Garden, what I think used to be the TGI Friday's has now been converted into a very theatrically camp dining hall called Papageno's. It was impossible to get into any restaurants without having to queue. We drank at the King's Arms, which was packed with hirsute men of all shapes and sizes. They love their drink more than exercise, to say it kindly.

This week followed Piano-moving Sunday, which sat on my mind all week. Why? X finally moved his piano out of my house last Sunday. His tall lanky friend came to help, and that friend of his is one of those gay men that I can do without. Attention-seeking, self-absorbed, always subscribing to some new form of pretentiousness, and unable to hold down a relationship of any duration. If you're a couple, and you have "friends" like that, you may as well be alone. Because such "friends" have no interest in the welfare of your relationship, either because they are unable to help, or because they harbour envy.

So the piano-moving proceded smoothly, and my feathers were unruffled until the end. X had a tragic story to relate to me on the doorstep.

The background is this. When X and I had the mother of all rows, the one that finally broke us up 18 months ago, the irreconciliable row, it was started at a party. This party was thrown by a couple to which we were acquainted, in X's circle of "friends". I'm not fond of parties anyway, because I find there are too many people acting in pretentious manners, and I see no need for any of that.

At this party, I was infuriated by the self-centred, emotionally ignorant attitudes of some of X's friends. The kind of people who like to bounce around like grasshoppers in summer sunshine, and who when winter comes, fly south while other grasshoppers die off or beg food from industrious ants.

The row escalated rapidly to a key failing in our 9 year relationship. The issue of loyalty. Within a primary loving partnership, loyalty to each other should exceed any other loyalty (except to the children, if there are any). Well, when I'm being told once again that I would never be placed above X's "friends", and it seems clear to me that these are friends that are unworthy.... I really have to wake up and realise that X is incapable of ever understanding Love, let alone delivering it. His ability to say "I love you" in the context of "I need you" is as easy as having a shit, and with the same useful end product.

Back to Piano Moving Day: X announced that the couple who threw that party, had broken up since, after many years together. And after they broke up, one of them committed suicide.

I was appalled by the tragedy, and I despise the expectation that I should adopt the reaction of sadness to such an event. Sadness might seem the prescribed response of a Church of England vicar, but then they don't really change the world that way, do they? I was angry, angry, angry. How many "socially aware" and "new age" types were at that party, ignorantly revelling on the Titanic bow of this gay couple's partnership? And where were they to lend an ear after the couple had split up?

Amidst my feelings of anger, I also felt vindicated. After all this time, tragic proof that X's circle of friends weren't any more use as human beings than any new stranger you could chat to at your local pub. It is as well that I broke off my relationship after all. There really isn't a sufficiently widespread understanding of Love in this day and age, for the likes of our relationship to have had the nourishment it needed.

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

The new Bridget Jones

Went to see the new Bridget Jones last night, and still feeling lovely. It was funny, and packed with everything that has to do with the search for perfect love. And so be it. If it makes me feel good, enjoy it. It's all fantasy, but wow, does it work! I mean, I felt I was glowing when I woke up this morning.

Was with Tom, at the UGC West India Quay, and he made good company.

It's hard to be on a computer when you're feeling really good. Which says a lot in general about writers, journalist and bloggers, and their product.

Friday, November 19, 2004

I could do that! Expanding Foam Filler and Double Glazing

Expanding Foam Filler. You might have seen a tradesman use it, when installing windows, (or a bit of plumbing through a wall). Great! It comes in a can, you spray it. What could be easier? You could easily do that, couldn't you?

And those people who have never done a stick of mechanical or building work, would play one of the dumbest games that London people play. A monkey could do that! Any Sun reader could do that! What's the fuss, and why should I have to pay you any money for it at all! Indeed, I'm so much better than you, I drive a BMW and I'd never ever dirty my hands, but if I had to, doing what you do would be a piece of cake! So lick my ass or I'm not even going to pay you!

Even the use of Expanding Foam Filler has to be learnt as a careful skill. You have to be aware of ambient room temperature and moisture conditions, you have to know how much water with which to spray the substrate and the foam itself. This you have to know to predict how much the foam will expand until it finally sets solid, and therefore determines how much you apply it, how quickly etc. You have to know how close to the surface you place the nozzle, and then the perfect trigger pressure and movement to get a perfectly adhering bead. And all this affects how much foam you get out of a can. You might get 5 times more final expanded foam volume out of a single can when you know how to use it economically.

I was wondering why my window glazing company had been a bit stingy with the foaming around my new windows. ALL window installers in the double-glazing business are self-employed contractors. Even the overpriced ones like Anglian, BAC, or Everest which so wonderfully manage to extract as much money as possible from prissy Chelsea Housewives and the many other varities of precious middle-class snobs, and then successfully give as little as possible of that money to the window installer. No, it mostly all goes to prosperous office managers, salesmen, executives, and owners. So your window installer, being a contractor, has to economize on the amount of expanding foam he uses. Because it isn't cheap, as building materials go, and these guys are not expense-accounted suits who are lunching at a hotel by the M25. They have to pay for most of their own tools and consumables.

GRRR!. Some of the worst aspects of the English class society live on in the hearts and minds of the middle-class people who happily exploit those who do all the work for them, yet constantly refuse to acknowledge it. I really hope their ignorance one day earns them their just desserts.

Thursday, November 18, 2004

Cmos, LILO, NT passwords - Data recovery

Cmos, LILO, NT passwords - Data recovery

Well, well, the following debug sequence really DOES clear the CMOS Setup password


DEBUG [Enter]
O 70 2E [Enter]
O 71 0 [Enter]
Q [Enter]

Ok, so a Pentium 233 Mhz is now considered to be as antique as a Reliant Robin. In fact, whole PCs of this ilk go for about £30 on Ebay. Well, what surprise is that when brand new PCs with all bells and whistles are available at Staples and at Dell for under £400?

They're disposable items nowadays. Anybody who used to be a Computer Engineer might as well be a Television or VCR Engineer. Waste of intelligence. But then, they never tell you at school that intelligence has a shelf life and a sell-by date, do they? Probably because the teachers are past their own.....

Tuesday, November 16, 2004

Need a Sauna

Woke up yesterday morning feeling blissful after my Sunday evening out. The kind of blissful where you know you don't even want to open your eyes, because whatever happens out there would ruin it. Baby bliss, I guess is what it is, and for that I suppose I have to thank my parents for a safe and suitably provided babyhood.

Well, the day went on okay, until I tried to use Mark's number that I had recorded into my mobile, only to find that I had missed out a digit somewhere. How useless am I? Those buttons on a Nokia are for cybertwits, not for disorganised incompetents as me. You can't hear their confirming beeps over the DJ's loud music. How am I ever going to have friends that I click with on my level, if I can't even get this right? Oh well, so I'll have to live with myself, myself, and only myself. Wow, that's at least three of us, how kinky!

Of course, a bike ride, dancing, and drinking take its toll at my age, and the pain to be paid for the pleasure only reaches its peak 24 hours after. I should expect this by now, which is why I might as well write about it so that I'll remember to expect it next time. So this morning, I had a nightmare, quite a sophisticated one, and when I awoke, I felt awful, with a bit of a sore throat threatening as well. And as usual, after an hour, it becomes apparent to me that my body is aching and complaining and muscles are stiff tight and sore in a way that I had not been aware of yesterday. Hence the nightmare. I'm such an animal.

Oh give me a sauna. There's something I would have if I were rich. My own, personal wooden sauna hut with attached outdoor jacuzzi under conservatory glass, in a small gentle valley and bunny rabbits hopping around in view. It's not just the Beckhams that need one, just because he gets paid for physical exertion.

**

Chatting to a very bright and suburban woman around my own age at Queeruption brought me some validation that was worth a million half-witted counsellors (ahem..). I was telling her how I feel more relieved than in 3 years, now that my Dad finally died, and she was saying that was exactly what happened to her when she lost her father a few years ago to cancer. As she said, "it's as though you've got your whole life on HOLD, just waiting for it to happen". Oh she is very cheerful and bright this one, and as she pointed out, now her Mom is getting seriously ill. Well, I wondered, will it be easier this time? Not entirely, says she, because she's had to contemplate what it is like to become an orphan!

I always try to anticipate these things and then imagine them in the hope of being prepared for when they happen. That's how I do things, it's not necessarily the best way. So the orphan reference also hit home. I've been very aware of it. And I figure it's an essential part of growing up. Everyone, eventually, has to get orphaned, unless they die before their parents do. You can imagine it before it actually happens, and even act it out (eg kids who run away from home and start up their own lives on the street), but only when the real orphaning becomes imminent, can you ascertain whether your imagination has been accurate and comprehensive.

Enough talking for me, my sore throat means that I have to cut short this speaking engagement. Good evening, and please remember to keep on laughing, and attending charity balls. After all, the richest people seem to do nothing but.


Monday, November 15, 2004

Queeruption

Squish, squidge, and amorphous and amoebic and the blog world shifts about like a mist. Bye to Cybersatan, who has left the blog habit and taken all his erudite writing with him.

So on AJ's suggestion, I biked down to the Queeruption Tea Party at Whitechapel. Oh I shan't bleat about how alternative it is... I don't want to be a purveyor of Cool and Alternative, unless I'm being paid for it...

Arriving by myself, since AJ had to cancel suddenly, I wasn't sure at first if it was my cup of tea, although they amazed me by having Hibiscus and Cinnamon, which was exactly what I had in my mind. It wasn't busy, maybe 40 people max, and the atmosphere was alien to me until the ice was broken by Mark, and then the rest of the evening was fun. We seemed to click somewhere on a head-level, which is an infrequent event for me. There was all sorts of music, but his friend Bridge put a lot of house on after lots of punk and eclectica by the previous DJ's, and then dancing just had to be done. Actually it was that angelic Nineties French song Voit le Voyage or whatever it is she says in French, that really stirred up my spirit. Diaphanous whirling sensuous connection to the heavens.

And truly, if Gay Men have had their day and are now universally as dull as dishwater, then Queeruption proved to me that we live in the Golden Age of Young Lesbians. There has never been a better time to be a lesbian, and like all things, that time will eventually pass. But tonight, the lesbians were the truly stunning people who were making the dress-up effort and having fun and making the fun exploratons that gay men were making 12 years ago. I was rather challenged in my perception of the difference between men and women. These were some of the the cutest and handsomest lesbians I have met in a London pub: they were attractive regardless of their gender or sex. Gosh, I wouldn't mind being a young lesbian today!

At lunch I ended up at the Golden Fleece with S and P after attending the minor hitch with his broadband installation. Gosh, is that all there is to ADSL, now? No wonder I don't have a job. Everything is such a basic commodity these days; I'm just waiting until commoditisation finally reaches the legal, medical, accounting and political professions. Disposable items, not requiring the investment of expensive expert knowledge.

Anyway, the food was terrible but the Adnam's Fisherman ale that they have on tap was utterly wonderful. A fluid beer, pleasant and convivial. It was P's birthday week too.





Saturday, November 13, 2004

Bridget Jones Diary

It came out on TV tonight to help promote the sequel. When the first one came out in the cinemas a few years ago, I didn't really get caught up in the hype.

So here I was exhausted and impoverished in spirit from hanging my door yesterday, and then installing the door set and latch, and wallpapering around it today.

All that planing and chiselling and drilling and screwing,
and filling and sizing and cutting and glueing.

Flaked out on my sofa, and wondering why the success of my hard work was not enough to stop me feeling crappy.

And now, after watching Bridget Jones, I feel all smiley inside. I'm such a girl sometimes. Is that sexist of me?

It's a feel good movie, but why? Because Bridget makes all the mistakes, and hilariously so, but still there is a happy ending? No, there is more to it than that. It's because Bridget carries with her throughout the ideal of love.

It's quite difficult to remember the ideal of love and the young innocence that it was learned with. And then of course there are the bitternesses of the mistakes that are made. But remembering the ideal of love, just sets the inner smile aglow. And what a timely, timely reminder. Just when I was wondering what was missing.

I wonder how people survive the drudgery of hard working lives without the luxury of carrying this ideal. I know I do not survive it well, and I am reminded.

(funny Freudian slip, I mistyped drudgery as drugdgery. Freudian slips answer your own questions, don't they? London has until the last two years been famous for its drug depending youth, who have for years been coasting on diets of Ecstasy and Clubbing. i.e. They have been surviving the drudgery with drugs. Or am I the drugd gery?)





Thursday, November 11, 2004

Mushroom Day

What a very beautiful day it was today, despite last night's rain. Blue, blue skies.

It has made me feel so bright that I'm actually having difficulty remembering what the beginning of the week was like, and have just been looking back at my blog to figure out what's been happening. What the hell did I do on Monday? I must have been in a right funk That must have been the day I brought the PVC roofing sheet back on the train from the Wickes in Goodmayes. Oh yes, after posting the letter at Seven Kings, having earlier been looking at banks in Wanstead.

Anyhow, I zipped out in the early morning to look at these mushrooms, as mentioned before, and decided to leave the extraordinary specimens for the daytime walkers to view. Like flowers, mushrooms have their ornamental life. I reckoned these could last another day. And if nobody had picked them, then I would have them after dark.

So indeed I took one, after doing a night shoot. Tapped the spores along all the grassy areas on the way home. I am pragmatic after all. Allow a beautiful mushroom, like a mushroom, to be enjoyed by everyone for its ornamental value while it is in its prime. But then give Nature a helping hand, to compensate for all the abuse Man gives Her in a place like London, and in the Industrialized world. Took it home, discovered that I had dropped my film camera somewhere, and went all the way back to find it lying on the ground where I had used it. At home again, I examined my mushroom in detail to confirm its type, and indeed it was at its age limit, as proven by the fleshy part going soft and spongy, as Carluccio described. Tasted some of it raw, which was very nice. Broke half of it into chunks and tossed it in the frying pan with a bit of chicken fat and salt. After 2 to 3 minutes on low heat, it shrivelled up to maybe half the size and was giving off that gorgeous mushroom smell. Ate the chunks. GORGEOUS. I WANTED MORE. Thank you Andy, and Antonio Carluccio, for introducing me to a new food. It gets difficult to find simple good food these days. I am no fan of tescoasdasainsburymorrisonisation. Not all of us get to live like my hero, Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, who was on TV tonight, or like Rick Stein.

In between, I spruced up a general version of my CV and took it down to the Theatre Royal Stratford East, with an interest in being a casual Box Office assistant. Although I did not feel encouraged by the two that were at the time manning the Box Office. Oh well. Stratford was generally bothering me, but probably because I am actually starting to act on my instincts instead of just feeling I must endure. To Morrisons, where there were no nuts in shells at all. There seems to be a general shortage this year in Brazil Nuts especially, because Tescos had none of them, not even in their Mixed Nuts bags.

On my bike ride home I hailed another cyclist who was towing a commercially-made bicycle trailer. I was amused by the device, not having seen one quite like it. Always a comfort to meet other people who are even more fanatical than I am in their opposition to being car sheep or society sheep.

And then at home, I had a nap attack, when Michael from the double-glazing company came knocking on the door again. He must like the coffee. He had the prescribed wood resin, tested it on some unfinished pine, and decided that it was a clear over-lacquer, and that a coloured stain was needed underneath it. Oh well, no further at a finished installation, but at least he saved me from lapsing back into double Circadian cycles.

So then I finished the wall preparation around my Cloakroom doorway. And then dropped off a little food present at S's for his birthday week.

So where am I again? Can we please have more sunny days like this in an English Winter? I think they do the business. Next job: hanging the damn door that I bought all the way back in June.


Wetherspoons Pubs

It's raining again. But as I walked home from Ilford train station, because the 23:32 was delayed (why, oh why did FIRST lose their GER train license, unless it was because of the perverse ignorance of the Labour Government about Engineering, first demonstrated by their Railtrack fiasco? GER has for almost a year now been owned by ONE, whoever the fuck they are), I consoled myself:

In the globally overheated Sahara, they would be so thankful for this rain, that they would probably fuck camels to show the heavens their gratitude

So in the British winter climate, pub drinking is a survival trait. Which is why I decided to go drinking at the Wetherspoons in Goodmayes.

And dead (spirtitually) as Goodmayes may appear on a Wednesday night, I cannot, on my life, fault Wetherspoons. This chain of English pubs, although it can be criticised for being the MacDonalds of Real Ale pubs, always impresses me on one, insurmountable fact. Where the hell do they manage to get such professional staff? No matter what Wetherspoons you walk into, in England, their staff, for the pittance that they are paid, are saints. If I were Human Resources director at Goldman Sachs, I would insist that all newbies must have slaved through the Wetherspoons vetting and training process. I would place that qualification above any half-rate first class degree from Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, or Bristol.

Wetherspoons, for the first time since its birth (was it in the early 90s or late 80s), is for the first time, reporting slowing profit growth. Their pub philosophy is pure. No music. No Sky sports. Every booze you can want, but most importantly, the guarantee that several real ales will always be available. And drinks prices that try to compete with supermarkets. Sometimes their guest ales are divine: I once had a Snow- something ale in February. It was as good as a Real Ale experience can get. Ever diverse. For real Ales, when you drink them, promise an unending diversity of tastes and effects.

Sadly, the days of rebellion against international monotony and monopoly are waned, or maybe even gone forever. Today, walk into any bar in London, and you will most likely be faced with that most vile of drinks, the one that shames the description, "duck's piss". I mean, Budweiser, the American beer. What are Americans good for, if they dare to sell this rubbish all around the world? Nothing. Budweiser neither offers alcohol nor taste. It is for spotty Puritans who grow up into mullet-wearing Marlboro-smoking non-voting social wastrels.

What's happened to CAMRA? The Campaign for Real Ales, that once raged through every square foot of this island in the Seventies and Eighties? You tell me. Even the Guardian doesn't mention them much. They live on in Devon. They fade away, like the English Apple.

Which brings me to the feature on BBC Newsnight yesterday by George Monbiot on the disappearance of apples. I have never seen him on television, and was surprised at his youth, and his inability to express anger. What a waste of time. Did he teach me any intention that I didn't already have about apples in England? Like where I can buy some real ones in London? I mean, I last picked a real apple from a wild tree on a "wasteland" bank in the Docklands of Beckton. And even at the Audley End English Heritage gardens (gosh, isn't a blog great for reminding you of a summer that seems like it was 500 years ago, even though it was only 3 months ago?) I noted the apple collection.

Enough of my own self-righteousness. George is too academic. The world doesn't need more academics, informed and educated and correct though they may be, to get the message across to the Masses. Instantly, the distance between George Monbiot, and any man-on-the-street who cannot afford to become scientifically absorbed in any single-issue, leaps out from the television and tells you: "This man is living in a world of his own. Yeah, and so when are these apples going to be on sale at Asda?"

So, I pity the English Apple. I think it would have been served better if I had simply spread a rumour like, "Have you heard that Wayne Rooney's Mom walked into his bedroom, and found him stuffing a rare English Apple up his own arse? "






Wednesday, November 10, 2004

Bright Day

Blue skies in the morning, clouded over in the afternoon.

Very productive day. Felt it even before I opened my eyes. Fixed the PVC roofing over the back patio. Was up and down the ladder. Michael from the double-glazing company turned up to put on my window handles, but they gave him white ones, which was the wrong colour, although they thought I'd accept it? In any case he fixed the trickle ventilator for the bathroom window, which delighted me. And at least I can now open my wooden windows, until they can change the handles.

Didn't eat a thing till 5pm and felt full of energy all day. Michael is a great guy, this is the second time he's been here and he makes excellent company. Why can't I know more of these types of people? It has nothing to do with love or sex. Even high minded notions of friendship don't come into the equation. He's the kind of person whose company I enjoy. Maybe menopausal middleage has the advantage of allowing me to explore these platonic relationships. After all, there has got to be more to life than unreliable love and short-lived sex!

Tuesday, November 09, 2004

Surviving a November Day

Today's weather: Solidly dull and gray. Chilly, but not windy and not rainy. This is classic English November. You don't see it in tourist brochures.

Today's Bright Spots:
  1. A walk in circles on the Wanstead Flats. It starts of as an aimless wander, and perks me up after half an hour. What light there is, you have to be outside that it may fill your vision. The long grass is sopping wet, but catching a skyful of gray daylight beats the hell out of being indoors. And out of a grassy bit I spotted Two Gigantic Mushrooms, each 9 inches across, side by side and their hats kissing in communed fusion. Today's pleasant surprise. I don't have a digicam, but I might take a film photograph of it yet.
  2. Going to Tesco's supermarket. This seems ridiculous at first, but as soon as I enter the Tesco's in Goodmayes, I feel better. Their lighting makes all the difference. Fluorescent light is making a comeback, because in Shoreditch a new hotel on the High Street features it in their exterior lighting scheme. Fluorescent light may not be the same colour as sunlight, but when spread out in quantity, it can emulate the light coming from a bright sky. I decide that S.A.D. is wrongly described as a Disorder. I'm going to call it SEasonal Lack of LIght Condition. SeLLiC. It wasn't a human disorder until electric lighting was invented. Under natural circumstances, the hibernation response brought upon by winter darkness is an advantage to survival through a long, cold winter when less food is available. I refuse to be labelled as having a disorder in our modern technological civilisation for a condition which once was a natural biological advantage.
  3. On my way home, having stopped off at the Wickes to buy some Wood Preservative, I'm waiting at a train station. A fellow coming off work, with a Hi-Viz Vest that mentions something to do with Cable Prep, arrives on the platform with a salty older colleague. He is genetically handsome, cranially and physically, fit, ruddy with health. On the train, just for the sake of comparison, I look around at the many people in the car, and it is obvious that he is about 200% more attractive than any man or woman there. I can't understand why women don't just walk up to him and insist on bearing his children, even if they know that he won't be able to stick around. I would! As it happens, while he chats on his mobile phone it sounds like he is happy and has a happy wife at home. God bless, I was worried that he'd be wasted. Hope they have thousands and thousands of grand children one day.
  4. Trying to convince the Tesco's Manager to improve the pedestrian access. They're refurbishing the supermarket and the car access. But just on two days this week I have witnessed some sad old folk struggling to get down the unfriendly stairs. There is NO pavement on that side of the main road, so they are forced to walk down some stairs to the supermarket level. They have the alternative of a very long zigzagging wheelchair access ramp, but without a wheelchair, it takes three times as long to go down the ramp as to struggled down the stairs. Wheelchair access is another madness of Political Correctness: most wheelchair disabled people arrive at a supermarket front door by taxi. But loads of money is spent on providing wheelchair access ramps like these, while your generally infirm arthritic, rheumatic, walking-stick-using, crumbling old people suffer on badly designed pedestrian access. The Western World needs to go back to Common Sense. But the Tesco's Manager actually took my point, after some persuasion, and promised to mention it to his superiors. At least the idea has been planted in one man's brain. Which is more than this blog achieves, methinks.
  5. Chocolate. It is the only thing that compensates for the serotonin deficit of SeLLiC. It works. If only the West African farmers were paid a fair price for their cocoa. Perhaps they should form a Cocoa Cartel, and force their local price up, before they sell it to the International Monopolies. Perhaps they should email me and ask me to become their spokesman. I wouldn't mind business trips to Accra or Lagos in the middle of the British Winter!

Sunday, November 07, 2004

Fury against Alcohol on Alcoholics

Wandered into town and into Shoreditch, and was pleasantly surprised at how it was rocking. Not just cool (which is boring), but actually rocking, eclectically.

And then I went to the Joiner's Arms, and my heart went to fury.

Transformed into something nondescript and soulless, just by revamping it's back and side walls. Grimly unhappy barstaff. I knew there was something terribly wrong, and in a rage, I looked for the owner. There he was at the bar. Unrecognizable. Withered. Shrunken. Shrivelled. Like any alcoholic that has lost the fight against their foremost vulnerability. He reminded me of my Dad on his deathbed.

For those of you who think drink is just a pleasure, and deny that for some people, it is a disease: so angrily do I feel against the callousness towards primary alcoholism, that I would prescribe Islam if necessary, if that is what it takes to rescue them from your ignorance.

I vented my rage at him, but since he was drunk, it was like water off George Bush's hairdo.

This in a week where David Morley was murdered in a queerbashing by London TEENAGERS. This outraged the London gay community enough so that there was a candlelight vigil in his memory. Why? Because finally some people realise that London is atomised and contains some dangerously unhappy people. Your average fragile pensioner in London knows what a hazardous and hateful place this city can be. But when cowards seek out a gay man and murder him, it agitates other gay men who happen to know that there are so many gay men in London who are SO self-destructive, that a brutal and savage murder is horrifically uncalled for.

And the most cynical and dangerous people of all will think: Well, if some gay men are so self-destructive, then better that they be the ones that get murdered, than any others........

For indeed, these people know that the measure of success in a population is not whether you have lots of money, lots of so-called friends, lots of so-called good looks, lots of so-called sex, but whether you have lots and lots and lots of children, and are doing so with minimal expense to yourself, and maximum expense to the society at large. And they really don't give a damn if someone else gets murdered, whether or not they were a feeble old-age pensioner, or a gay man.

This is why London is about survival, and not about being cool, or rich, or more intellectual. Welcome to London. Spend your money on your airfare to get you home.

Friday, November 05, 2004

What is the point of the Internet

Gosh, even Madame Tytania has disappeared from the blogworld. What is the point of the Internet? Did Homer Simpson vote Republican in Arizona? Is November the darkest month? Am I rambling? How many fireworks does it take to make a Guy Fawkes night in London? When does the world actually change?

How many bloggers does it take to change a lightbulb?

Went to a local pub on Wednesday night. It is a straight pub, of course, and I had a delightful time. It was quiz night, the atmosphere was friendly, the beer was cheaper than in town, the people were eclectically varied. The quizmaster was a dead ringer for that Karl what's his name who used to star in Brushstrokes. I had a good time, the first in over a month.

Why blog, when you can go to a pub? Unfortunately it is much cheaper to drink at home, and money rules everyone's brains, so the pubs are fewer and much less busy. England used to be built around pub culture. Now I don't know what it is built on, but the Internet really doesn't matter, does it?

I mean, I was amazed to discover that someone found my blog through the following Google search:

prostitute zones in ilford in the daytime

I wish it weren't so late, I'd be off to the pub otherwise!

Thursday, November 04, 2004

R.I.P. United States of America

R.I.P. United States of America
(1776 - 2004)

I'm so sorry to hear about the death of your democracy. It must be a very trying time for you. In these difficult times, may God light your way. You must not give up faith in Him. And if you want someone real to talk to, you can always message me.


I came upon these peculiar references in an archive in one of the antiquated molecular memory cell storage systems. I wondered at what was the United States of America bit. I have heard of the Republican States of America, which existed for a short time in the early 21st century, as a precinct ruled by the Global Coalition of Corporate Monopolies. They were famous for their obese people who roamed the North American plains freely until they were hunted into extinction by our great ancestors. Shame. Wonder what they tasted like?
So I did some research. It took me ages, (over 35 minutes!) to reactivate the even older Optical Data reader systems. Apparently there used to be a United States of America until 2006. In that year, it was split into the Democratic States of America and the Republican States of America. This apparently resulted from an election at the end of 2004 which tragically restored a Bio-Muppet by the name of George Bush as President of its country.
Gosh, weren't people stupid in those days. I ran through some videos of their entertainment systems and feeding systems and I couldn't stop laughing at their civilisation. They must have been genetically hybridised with sheep! Even worse than the Bio-Muppets, who at least made some contribution to the genetic design of the worthy opponents of our ancestors.
Oh well, I better get back to work. I have another deadline in 25 milliseconds.

Wednesday, November 03, 2004

In search of a more Useful Condolence

Condoling?
"I'm sorry to hear about your Dad", in the standard condolence tone of voice, is getting on my tits now.
Yeah, well, he's dead now, so he doesn't care now does he? And while he was dying slowly and painfully, I wasn't getting as much sympathy as projected fear. And when the help was needed it wasn't much there. So what is the point of condolences NOW?

Only one person so far has had the intelligence to say: "I suppose you are all eager to get on with your lives now.." She is 75, so SHE knows the difference between people who are bereaved suddenly or bereaved gradually.

Indeed. If I were so stupid to have not done most of my painful mourning before he died, having had so much time and warning, I wouldn't need condolences anyway! I'd need a brain transplant! So, yessirree I want to get on with my life. I don't need condolences NOW. I needed them while he was dying. NOW I'd rather have a job. Even a blow job. Or just filthy amounts of cash would do. Or even just a smattering of useful intelligence would be preferable to:

"I'm SO SORRY to HEAR ABOUT YOUR...."


Tuesday, November 02, 2004

Drole One-liners

From the entertaining but unfortunately titled movie "White Mischief" showing on TV on Sunday night (I'd only seen the second half before), starring Charles Dance, Trevor Howard, Greta Scacchi etc. About aristocratic Brits living decadently in the Forties in Kenya, while back in Europe life was deprivation and War, War, War..
  • What happens to a woman after she loses her looks? Nothing.
  • He's got the bitch back, so he might as well have the kennel too. (He was being cuckolded, so killed his wife's lover and then bought the house of the dead rival).
  • Why are banks so happy to lend you an umbrella when the sun is shining, only to ask for it back as soon as it starts raining?



Monday, November 01, 2004

F**king 56k V.90 and V.92 Modems

V.92? V.90? V.34? 56K Modems? Baloney? Winmodems = Controllerless Modems and assign controller functions to the computer processor. Controllerless modems are cheaper. There is one lower level yet, and that is the Softmodem, where the both the controller and Data pump functions are handled by your Windows Software, leaving only the Data Access Arrangement on the tiny little modem card.. The U.S. Robotics website doesn't admit to selling a Softmodem, but their model USR5660A is listed on there. They seem ashamed of it.
Being a softmodem, it was dirt cheap: equivalent of £7.00 in Canada after rebate, so I bought one. Waste of time.. The V.90 and V.92 standards that allow 56k connections are only possible on good quality telephone lines, namely ones where the telephone company runs digital links to an analog converter in your nearby neighbourhood. And then your ISP has to have V.92 capability, and there must be no more than one Analog to Digital Converter between your ISP's servers and your PC.
In Toronto, this meant that I couldn't even get a V.90 connection. Her e in London, I can get V.90 and even V.92 connections, but only at connection speeds of 44000 bps. Unfortunately the connections are horribly unstable - they lose carrier within 2 to 15 minutes. On forcing the US Robotics Softmodem to V.34, I actually get a reliable connection, but because it is a softmodem, where ALL the modem functions are carried out by the PC's processor, I was getting better performance on my original 7 year old 33.6k modem.
What a waste of time? Another failure by me, although I now know more about modems than I used to... And more reason to never buy on Brand name alone. So that's why those external modems cost so damn much..