Gertsamtkunstwerk

Don't say 'chav'

Some nobody writes in the Guardian Stop laughing and don't use the word 'chav'.

His contention is that it's just middle-class sneeriness at poor people.

No it isn't. He has compassion for all those poor working class people who can't afford proper designer gear. Well, it may be news to him on his bloated 'journalist's' salary, but most middle class people can't.

He criticises journalists who probably have never even sat next to a chav on a bus. Well, that may well be true, but it wasn't journalists that coined the phrase. It was ordinary middle-class people who also don't sit next to chavs on the bus, because chavs, like journalists, don't use the buses. On the other hand, middle class people and poor people use the buses.

The derision of chavs is based on derision of a lifestyle choice not on a life situation. When I first started blogging I came across the term 'council' or, in Scotland, 'schemey', which is far more offensive, implying a wholescale sneer of the millions of people who live in social housing.

Sneering at loud-in-yer-face tasteless chavs is a perfectly reasonable reaction to some increasingly dated belief that all taste is of the same value.

His argument seems to be that you mustn't criticise McDonalds for being sugar-and chemical-filled junk food because it's equally valid with nutritious whole food, and, besides, it's what poor people eat. Despite not knowing the cost of a McDonalds burger nor the disposable income of poor people.

That having been said, the word 'chav' is so 2004 and it's time that the newspapers realise that those at the cutting edge have stopped using it.

Film?

There's a bloke dribving a car along a mountain pass somewhere in the USA. He's subjected to Road Rage by a truck driver, and the rest of the film is about how that plays on his mind.

J. says says Jeff Goldblum. I say Dennis Quaid.

But what's the bloody name of the bloody film?

J. says it's been made three times. Bt he might be wrong.

Stalkers

This lot, all six of them. Came into my curry house.

Pretty obvious they are stalking my family and ought to be arrested.

1) Social worker, lives 35 minutes drive from Tatton Park and 'likes going there'. Is down in London to visit the Royal Academy.

2) Couple, late twenties, early thirties, househunting in the Ilkley area

3) Mention Britian's oldest pub, which I know is Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem in Nott'm.

And then they come to my curry house and boast about how they're stalking my family...

Basta! Vergogna!

Crap Day...

It wasn't intended to be my day. Weatherwise not great. Cold and sleety, although not as cold or sleety as it has been.

Burst water main on Brixton Hill, the A23. No traffic allowed through. Most importantly, all buses on diversion. So I walked to the Tube Station. Half an hour down hill. By the time I got to Housing Benefit I was leggy-achy. I always tend to think of Housing Benefit as being Central Brixton. Well, you would wouldn't you. but it's still a good walk from there to the Tube.

Minor bomb scare at work - just a suspect package in the Post Room, but two PA announcements are a disturbance, especially when as part of the Emergency Response Team you're on slight tenterhooks wondering if you'll have to unleash the sniffer hounds of hell.

Afternoon course in another building. The building where, four years and two moves ago I started my less-than-illustrious career in this august department. Silly place in relation to our current building and public transport in general. Especially when there's a bank trip needed in between. Not including the pause at the bank (£25 they're charging me for transmission of funds...), the walk took half an hour.

Debating how to get home. I decided that bus to Vauxhall would be the best thing. Then either a) train to Clapham Junction and another train to Streatham Hill or b) tube to Balham and train to Streatham Hill. Thinking that the Vauxhall to CJ trains might be full, or disrupted by snow in Surrey and remembering there was a power failure at CJ earlier in the week, I opted for Tube. As I changed at Stockwell they said that Balham Station was closed, due to flooding. So I ended up getting off at Clapham South and walking for half an hour along the South Circular. There is a bus but it's unreliable in the best of conditions. Indeed, the bus drew up to my alighting stop when I was just ten metres from it. The traffic is a total nightmare all round; I was right not to go Clapham Common because the bus route back is completely chocca with diverted traffic. That walk was only twenty five minutes, although much of it was into the biting East Wind. Leggy very achy.

Tomorrow I go to see the rheumatologist at Kings. I have two alternative ways to get there - half hour walk down Brixton Hill and bus, or train into London and out again...There's no point going by car - all the roads for miles around are choccachocca because of a big deep trench across Brixton Hill.

So I shall go to the Rheumatologist who shall ask 'How do you feel?' and I will say 'legs achey' before launching into all my other achey symptoms. Today we were mostly doing neck, and elbow, yesterday it was mainly feet, the previous day left elbow and right kneee, at the weekend it was face and left thigh. And I won't mention my insides.

Not that anything actually hurts as such, not to the extent of needing painkillers. Okay, I can no longer run, and I have forgotten what feels normal. And sometimes I can't walk. But today I managed an hour and a half walking and suffered only extreme discomfort.

But I think my trousers are totally ruined from walking through all the puddles, especially the ones at the Tesco building site at Clapham South.

And I nearly slipped on the cobbles at Strutton Ground. Cobbles are the spawn of satan and should be driven from the face of the earth.

One of my colleagues told me I can't wear skirts, or certainly not short ones, in our new building 'Valhalla' because I'm sitting next to the atrium, which is glass-panelled, on the third floor. I never wear skirts in winter, spring or autumn, but much of my 'cor what a scocher' wardrobe is shortish skirts. Another colleague has pointed out that no one will be able to see my PC screen where I'm sitting. I'm not convinced. We shall see.

Will you be wanting pictures of Valhalla and our £200 chairs?

Bloody bank...

And it isn't even mine...

Jimmy cashed in a PEP managed by HSBC, and was told it would be in his HSBC current account in five days. Two weeks later he got a letter from his bank saying he was past his overdraft limit and a payment to his HSBC credit card had been bounced. For these two transgressions he would have to pay a heavy penalty. He made investigations and it seemed that the PEP people had taken two weeks to make a payment into his current account. He then got his credit card statement charging him for the fact that his payment had bounced, not to mention the interest.

We are just awaiting his bank statement, due at the end of the week, before I write a very polite but very snotty letter demanding exactly why HSBC are stealing nearly a hundred pounds from him as a consequence of their ineptitude.

Ten days ago I attempted to buy a couple of tickets online with his card, but the card was rejected. I tried again this evening, but they didn't even let me get to the stage of submitting the card details before they said "Your tickets have been reserved, please arrange a bank transfer within five days in order to honour this arrangement." Or words to this effect - it was actually in German, not one of my main languages.

So tomorrow I shall go to a branch of my bank - in the lunchbreak before I attend a course in a building the other side of Westminster village - in order to make this transfer to a German bank. I suspect they will charge about £30 for this transfer - which I shall also demand back from HSBC.

Still, in the end I shall prove what a good girlfriend I am by taking him to Berlin for a romantic weekend as a birthday treat, with a concert at the Waldbuhne thrown in as an extra bonus.

Any suggestions as to what are must see sights in Berlin in August?

February 19

The Age of Aquarius could not end without mention of UK-Blogland's favourite Belgian, the lovely Zoe, girlfriend of a twat, who celebrated her much older than Scary but ever so slightly younger than TD birthday on Saturday. 

Also, my friend from school, Andrea B, aka, Roxy. Guess which Prince she was named after...

1473 Copernicus, astronomer
1717 David Garrick, actor, playwright and theatrical manager. There's a theatre in Altrincam named after him.
1924 Lee Marvin, Hollywood Legend, singer of the seminal "I Was Born Under a Wandering Star..."
1930 Gerald Sinstadt, the voice of (ITV) football, but also executive producer of the Maria Ewing Carmen, which gets shown every few months on the Performance Channel
1940 Smokey Robinson, Miracle
1952 Amy Tan, Joy Luck Club
1958 Helen Fielding, author of Bridget Jones
1960 Prince Andrew, waste-of-space money
1960 Leslie Ash, knows all about Men Behaving Badly

February 18

1745 Count Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta physicist/inventor (battery)

1848 Louis Comfort Tiffany glassmaker (stained glass windows)

1890 Boris L Pasternak Russian poet/writer (Dr Zhivago)

1929 Len Deighton, writer of airport blockbusters that I never read, but also (and producer of) Oh! What A Lovely War!

1931 Toni Morrison,novelist

1931 Ned Sherrin, Loose Ends

1932 Milos Forman, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Amadeus

1933 Yoko Ono. Hmmm...

1933 Bobby Robson, football coach extraordinaire

1943 Graeme Garden, Goody

1946 Michael Buerk, the coolest newsreader

1948 Sinead Cusack, actress

1949 Cybill Shepherd, actress

1954 John Travolta, actor

1963 Rob Andrew, goal kicker extraordinaire

1967 Colin Jackson 100 meter hurdler

1967 Roberto Baggio, great footballer

1975 Gary Neville, even greater footballer 

1983 Jermaine Jenas - as the lovely Londonmark once comemnted - in the days when Bobby Robson rather than that total tosser Souness was Newcastle manager - that made Jermaine Jenas exactly 50 years younger than Bobby. I repeated that fact to many people, some of whom said "Wow"...

Year 9 coursework time

Anybody want to take the piss out of some schoolies? - they're back...

They need 5 key facts about No. 10 Downing Street and 5 key safety points or actions when hill-walking in the UK...

Plácido in concert

The Palm Beach Post helpfully previews Plácido's concert next Sunday in Palm Beach. I'm guessing that the Dublin one will be similar.

My other office

The phone rang. I knew it would be a wrong number, but I answered it anyway.

"Is that the London Borough of Camden?"

"No, it's a lift in the Government Department name deleted

Pause. "Oh!" Pause. "I'm sorry..."

Leisure

Go to the pub? We'd rather see the opera

In the biggest survey of its kind, conducted by the Office of National Statistics for the Arts Council of England, it has emerged that participation and appreciation of the arts are more popular than sport and are widely indulged in across the social spectrum...according to the survey almost 90 per cent of English people attend some sort of art-related venue in a year...A day-to-day involvement with the arts appears to be such a core activity that it is not seen as a luxury...Armchair consumption of the arts is a staple activity

Mind you, you'd never guess from studying the media, where news bulletins and News 24 have their own dedicated Sports newsreader, and where minority sporting interests regularly hit the front pages of newspapers and Arts rarely do. And the newspapers and TV think politicians are out of touch. Pot meet kettle...

I think for all their talk of diversity the media in this country is controlled by a certain sort of nihilist who wants to spend his entire adult life apologising for his prosperous upbringing, fee paid education and opulent salary, and mixes exclusively with clones, rather than considering the tastes of the poor sods who do the unglamorous jobs and pay his salary, or the millions of older people (ie older than 23) who are not in thrall to the plastic-celebrity-consumerism-as-happiness culture. Besides, they're all so off their heads on coke they long ago lost the power of intelligent thought.

A couple of years ago I read an article about a local paper in Yorkshire, where the editor decided to strip out all the lifestyle articles and pseud-celebrity puffs, and instructed his reporters to go out and find news to report on. Sales soared...

Terms and conditions

I've just received an email from my ISP, BT Yahoo, informing me of changes to T&C. To be honest I'm not sure what has changed and what stays the same. I did however, notice the following comment.

We may take instructions from a person who we think, with good reason, is acting with your permission.

That looks eminently sensible to me. Last year, another arm of BT refused to accept a Switch payment from me for Jimmy's father's phonebill, because it was breaching the Data Protection Act - despite the fact that I had in front of me his name, address, customer account number and outstanding amount, and was giving them my bank details, and asking them no questions. So I had to take time out to go to the bank and pay by cheque, absolutely no difference in substance.

On the other hand, the other day I rang up the Tube to report Jimmy's Oyster Card as lost. They were quite happy to deal with me, understanding that that's how people organise their lives. Sure, she felt the need to ask him his security word, even though I was able to provide it, but overall I felt they dealt with it sensibly (And she laughed when I said he had lost it within days of buying it - that's usually the way, she said.

I also notice the ISP T&C prevent

to send, knowingly receive, upload, download, or use any material which is offensive, abusive, indecent, defamatory, obscene or menacing

So, that's the end to my abusive, indecent and defamatory blogging. I don't think its obscene under English Law and rarely menacing.

Seriously, one would assume that action is only taken in the event of material that a 'reasonable person on the Clapham omnibus would deem...', but still, one man's meat is another man's poison.

Nice judge, shame about the audit

Perusal of my referral stats reminds me that i haven't really blogged this series of Judge John Deed calm down, girls...

To be honest, I don't think it has been as good as previous series. Still, it's better than most telly, and Martin Shaw is unceasing eye-candy.

Perhaps part of my problem is that I have found the main storyline somewhat incredible. The one about the triple billing of defence contracts. A major defence contract that has gone over budget would definitely be examined by the National Audit Office - it really would not require allegations of bribery passed on by a High Court judge to spark an investigation.

The Public Accounts Committee section was wholly unconvincing. The chair of the PAC is by convention a senior - generally ex-Treasury minister - member of the Opposition party, not a lightweight maverick. The PAC simply would not have a hearing into such a case without investigations already having been carried out by the NAO, who would have provided a detailed brief for the chair and guidelines on questioning. And such a hearing, especially with the unconventional appearance of a minister (it's usually Permanent Secretaries that give evidence - that's why they're called Accounting Officers...), would not have been so sparsely attended by Press and public.

I am not suggesting that triple billing has never occurred, but I also know that such things can generally be identified by a trainee auditor or audit technician using relatively unsophisticated software, and such a test would have been run as part of routine financial audit. It may well be that the defence contractor triple-invoiced so sophisticatedly that such a test would have failed to pick it up. It is therefore unlikely that it would have been necessary to bribe the minister signing it off, who would have lacked the skills to identify irregularities without a briefing from the Finance Director. The FD would therefore also have to have been bribed, and, anyay, it is inappropriate for an FD to have hands-on detailed knowledge of individual transactions which would have been handled by a relatively junior accounts clerk. Therefore, you are talking widespread collusion or an utter waste of a bribe to the minister in question. I would have thought it better not to even mention it to the minister - bribery works so much better at contract awarding stage, whereas creative accounting is more important at invoicing stage.

I would also have thought - but perhaps I am betraying my naivety - that it would be foolish for a defence contractor to resort to bullyboy tactics, including murder and attempted murder. Defence contracts are so lucrative, one might as well play by the rules. It is unlikely that any company with a whiff of this sort of dodgy behaviour would get such contracts. But maybe I'm wrong.

Sloppy language alert

359 foods in cancer alert

Families nationwide were urgently warned yesterday not to eat 359 popular foods containing a banned dye linked to cancer.

Remembering that 'families' now means 'anyone with snivelling brats', I am horrified that

a) anybody would feed Pot Noodle to the snivelling brats they claim to care about and know how to raise; and

b) The Mirror thinks that the Food Standards Agency thinks it's perfectly okay for 23-year-old geeky single men living in bedsits to consume carciogenic Pot Noodle.

Drugs

About sixteen months ago I started a poll on drug use - Class A Drugs - and then got distracted and forgot about it.

74 votes cast, and 69% have never done hard drugs.

The poll has attracted comments

Ithink drugs r cool and i think that everyone sould take dem

and

**** ANYONE WHO DUS NOT DO DRUGS U ARE ALL STUCK UP MOTHER****ERS U NEED TO CHILL AND SMOKE SUM ON MY CRACK PIPE. I LOVE DRUGS , I HATE U.

Remember kids, Just Say No. I present conclusive evidence they rot the brain.

Carmen at RAH

We're off to see Gubbay's Carmen next weekend. Should be interesting, at the very least.

According to this review

The final murder is accompanied by a slow-motion enactment of Escamillo's triumph in the bullring, which blunts the scene's impact.

I have been trying to convince Jimmy that there is a real bullfight; he says he's not going if there is; I opined that probably RBKC wouldn't licence a bullfight.

It's not clear from this review whether any real animals are used.

Marcello Viotti RIP

Conductor Marcello Viotti, 50, Has Died Following Stroke and Surgery, very sad.

This was announced last night. Since Monday the Italian and German Press were saying that he was on a life support machine, whilst private sources were saying he was brain dead.

I played three of my favourite CDs, which were conducted by him.

Update Obituaries in  The Guardian, Independent, and Telegraph

Bored of celebrities

Just listening to the radio - apparently 3 out of 5 people are bored of Celebrities, and further one in five are 'celebrity resistant'. This is according to a survey by Mintel, and, I think, specifically relates to celebrity endorsement of products for marketing reasons.

Actually, I think it's more subtle than that. Just randomly looking at people at work, or people in the blogosphere, it's pretty clear to me that a clear, overwhelming majority of 'ordinary people' are interested in 'famous people'. Famous people who excel in a field - arts, entertainment, sport, whatever - that interests.

I suspect that it's a boredom with Celebrity Syndrome. It was interesting that BBC2's documentary on Auschwitz got a bigger audience than Celebrity Big Brother. Yet if you look at the mass circulation downmarket newspapers, or the plethora of glossy celeb mags you would think there was a national obsession with C-list publicity seekers. Heat was quite popular in my office for a while, when it had a bit of attitude, and I'm sure I'm not alone in buying the odd sneaky copy of Okay or Hello. But the air heads in PR make a mistake if they think we take it seriously.

I guess there's probably a whole demographic of women in their early twenties sporting Burberry fake tans living symbolically, if not actually, in the new towns of Essex and Hertfordshire who lap up every move of the various nonenties with hyperactive PR agents. But most of us are not interested in who happens to be in Bizarre/3AM; simply pursuing our interests in our own favourites via the context of their work.

I suspect that most 'readers' of mass-circulation downmarket tabloids get them for sports, or TV listings, or maybe even for news headlines, and generally flick over the celeb stories, unless they are graphic descriptions of illicit sex.

February 17

Celebrity birthday today is none other than the Troubled Diva, Mike,  43 today. This is how he and K typically celebrate Big Days

Other, not-so-famous birthdays:

1653   Arcangelo Corelli, composer and violinist
1867   William Cadbury - Mmmm. Chocolate...
1929   Yasser Arafat, recently deceased Nobel Laureate
1929   Patricia 'Hyacinth Bucket' Routledge. Legend, and practically a 'friend of the family'
1934   Barry 'Dame Edna' Humphries
1944   Bernie Grant, (jointly) first Black MP
1945   Brenda Fricker, Casualty and My Left Foot
1974   Jerry O'Connell. He was the fat kid in Stand By Me, has dated Geri 'Ginger Spice' Helliwell and is the nephew of a friend of mine, 'Whippy'

I'm in a limerick...

There is a great tenor from Spain
Whose high notes give Eddie a pain.
His splendid legata
Annoys dear Stregata
And suffers DonPaolo's disdain.

To others, this man from Madrid
Was tops in all that he did.
He mastered Otello
And always said hello
To each man and woman and kid.

This generous man from Espagna
Could savor a plate of lasagna,
While knitting a tie
And baking a pie
And teaching new roles to Alagna.

Consider our sweet Geraldine,
Who's passion for Placi is keen.
She'd do anything
To hear Placi sing
Or watch him conduct for the Queen.

Conversely, there's poor Tommy K.,
Whose taste is perversely outre'.
He'd rather eat worms
And roaches and germs
Than listen to Placido's A.

Thanks to LJO at rmo

London Phil

Nice little concert this evening. The London Philharmonic under Paavo Berglund.

I looked at my diary and wasn't that sure whether I particularly wanted to go. But I did, even though that meant missing the rival attraction of Joseph Calleja at St John's Smith Square.

First up was Beethoven's Leonore Overture. Oh, it does go on. Not unpleasant, but Beethoven, I mean, a genius... This was his third version; he revised it again. He tried writing an opera called Leonore, but failed so he rewrote it as Fidelio. I wonder how often it would be performed if it wasn't by Beethoven.

After the interval was Sibelius's Symphony No 2 in D. Not a bad piece of music, in places quite, you know, interesting. In fact, if it fell off free from the front of a glossy mag, I wouldn't bin it. And if it was programmed again in the future with something desirable, I wouldn't mind hearing it again. But with life being so short, and so many pieces of music around, I don't feel I really need Sibelius's Second in my life.

The highlight of the evening was Elgar's Cello Concerto. I went to a concert of this last year and was singularly underwhelmed, so I think I booked this evening in order to expunge the memory.

Oh, it was really quite wonderful. A piece that I really do like, played with amazing skill by Pieter Wispelwey. He really got into the whole dialogue with the orchestra bit; the orchestra were very good. I loved the way he seemed to play each note as if each note mattered. Quite unlike how I've heard it before.

February 16

1866 Johann Strauss I, composer - Radetsky March. Had a very famous son.
1876 George Macauley Trevelyan, historian
1922 Geraint Evans, bass-baritone
1935 Sonny 'I've Got You' Bono
1942 Kim Chong-Il, undisputed President of the Axis-of-Evil
1943 Anthony Dowell, ballet dancer
1954 Michael Holding, cricketer, immortalised, as a batsman, by Brian Johnson, when the bowler was Willey.
1959 John 'You Can Not Be Serious' McEnroe
1961 Andy Taylor, one of the Taylors of Duran Duran. Eminently forgettable
1964 Christopher Eccleston very great actor, soon to be Dr Who
1973 Cathy Freeman, Olympic Great

Reactionary populistic policy making on the hoof

Tories plan migrant health checks

It only applies to non-EU citizens entering for over six months or over a year, depending on the nature of the checks.

So no real deterrent again infectious diseases brought in by casual visitors or returning residents, or EU citizens.

Screening for treatable conditions is not a bad idea as a public health measure, but the Tories' planned spending cuts will jeopradise preventive health in general.

I expect they'll get all those unemployed dole-claiming doctors and nurses to do the immigramts' health checks.

What's that you tell me? The dole queues are not full of idle health professionals?

Better get some more in from foreign countries, then.

15 February

The biggest celebrity celebrating today is Scary Duck. Happy Birthday, Alistair, still two years older than me!

1564   Galileo Galilei, Let Me Go!
1748   Jeremy Bentham, invented Utilitarianism - the greatest happiness of the greatest number
1797   Henry Engelhard Steinway, piano maker
1812   Charles Lewis Tiffany, jeweller
1874   Ernest H Shackleton, explorer
1946   Clare Short, MP
1947   John Adams, composer - he has just picked up a few Grammys for his "On the Transmigration of Souls", a 9/11 remembrance. Most famous for Nixon in China and Death of Klinghoefer
1954   Matt Groening, created The Simpsons

14 February

This entry has been a long time time coming. But today we celebrate the birthday of not one, but two three, Bloggers.

Everyone's favourite Slinky Sleazy Sexy Saffir commentor Adrian 'Dot' Sevitz is of an uncertain age - let's just say it starts with 3 and ends in a BIG ZERO. Happy 300th birthday Adrain!! I'm a maybe for the Big Bash!

And occasional lurker Cat Brownie Hut is an undisclosed age today. 

After hours update My favourite New Zealander Daisy is about 29 today.

1942 Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York. No Rudy Giuliani
1944 Carl Bernstein of Watergate - they reckon nowadays that Deep Throat was a mixture of Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush sr
1951 Kevin 'Keggy' Keegan. He would have just loved it, yesterday, but ha! United won 2-0 at City...
1956 Tom Watt Football commentator, or, as we all know him Eastender's Lofty
1959 Renee Fleming, soprano. I saw her in concert last year, and I have a ticket to see her as Desdemona in the summer.
1969 Helen Baxendale, or as we all know her, Cold Feet's Rachel
1970 Simon Pegg, cult favourite actor

Paul McCartney

If I was a clever blogger I would have combined this post with the recent one on John Lennon. But I'm not clever, so it's separate.

It's basically a Greatest Hits of Wings, and Macca's 'solo'. I am pretty certain that I taped this off my brother Matt. Quiz question for one virtual brownie point. Where did Wings make their live debut?

No one can say that Macca isn't innovative. In the Sixties he wrote songs in the then dominant Beatles-style genre. Hang on, didn't he (co-)invent that genre. Or, as the Amazon review says

Truth-in-packaging regulations are strained to the breaking point--some previous work with a former band was pretty darn "best" too

In the 70s, he used the prevailing concept-rock fashion to produce songs such as Band on the Run. It is very typical of that in that long slow build up, a complete change of tempo heralded by Denny Laine's great little guitar riff. Obfuscatory lyrics, in fact the whole bang shoot. There's another passage , on bass, I think, that sounds very Seventies, but is used again in anticipating-the-Eighties-way on Goodnight Tonight, which, incidentally, I really like. Then in the Eighties he went very poppy.

I really love Ebony and Ivory. I'm sure some cynical bastard is reading this and making sicky-throwy-up noises. Guess what, Cynical Bastard, I don't care. There are three really good aspects of this record - the words, which were still pretty revolutionary in 1982; the ying/yang contrasts of the voices of Macca and Stevie Wonder; and thirdly, a certain je ne sais quoi, which may just be a trick of a clever studio engineer, but there is a pillar of depth of sound. I will add that I would take it away and edit it, cutting that silly half-rapped bit. But I guess that was pretty much bleeding edge in 1982. It just so happens that Labi Siffre and Madonna both did the pseudo-gospel much better.

I also like We All Stand Together. When it was out, I used to sing it and Matt would do a brilliant Frogs' Chorus. And I love Mull of Kinytre. So there...!

Macca is a legend, a supremely talented songwriter, a genius. But he also had the odd afternoon off over the years. These include Listen to Waht the Man Said; C-Moon; Maybe I'm Amazed; and Say Say Say.

February 1990

I was doing my Graduate Conversion Course on Block Release from my first proper job which I had had for four months)

As it happened, I only really spent two hours there (at college), one in the computer suite correcting the error that I had discovered on Tuesday evening. Then I went to the Economics tutorial - that was good; we talked about money. Then was lunchtime, another good larf.

After lunch I left - well, why not, all it was this afternoon was QT (Quantitative Techniques, from which I was exempt, having done Statistics at University, but even when exempt the exam, we were *supposed* to attend the lecture. BTW, the lecturer was the cousin of Aung San Suu Kyi, so we all knew about Burma long before it was news generally).

So I got the train to Victoria. I then decided I wanted to buy a couple of records. I tried Our Price on the station, and another record shop on Victoria Place, but neither sell Vinyl Discs. I eventually found Our Price on Victoria Street and managed to get the two albums I wanted - Street Fighting Years by Simple Minds, and Raintown by Deacon Blue, as well as some blank cassettes.

I then got the Underground and the train to Westcliff. It was really wonderful to have a hassle free journey - would you believe that it's the first time since last Tuesday that I got a train from Fenchurch Street and got home approximately an hour later. When I got home there was one message-less message on my machine. I thought it might be Helen 1, because she said that she would phone on Thursday afternoon. So I called her, but she said that she hadn't phoned. She said that she would call back when she had finished what she was doing. So she did and we nattered for ages. I also spoke briefly to Tim (with whom she was having a Platonic - she said - affair, despite being elsewhere engaged) , who sounds really nice.

When I had finished chatting with Helen, I watched Neighbours. Mrs Mangel got married. I was going to watch Home and Away, but the telephone rang - it was Grum phoning from work. We nattered for an hour - he had phoned during the day but found that I wasn't in. He had tried at work but nobody was in. We ended up chatting for an hour, which was good.

I discovered that I had overcorrected my mistake in the computer project, so that depressed me. I know I won't have time to correct the mistake and that is depressing. Because you see, it's yet another example of leaving things to the last minute and therefore doing it less than perfectly, and again, I'm failing to meet my potential.

Quite a good day . The plan didn't quite go to plan. The idea was to get up at about half seven to listen to my new albums, but of course I didn't. Nevertheless, I still had time to iron my shirt, and pack a few things for the weekend, and I managed to get a ticket before boarding the 0917 train. Theoretically that should get me to Croydon college on time - well, for eleven o'clock which was time today. But of course I didn't. At Victoria I just missed the 1036 East Grinstead train, so had to wait until 1047 Horsham train, which proceeded to stop at Balham for some unexplained reason and arrive late at East Croydon.

But I didn't miss anything I couldn't catch up on in Economics & after that we went to lunch. We were saying, á la timetable for next week, isn't it a shame that we have an optional Financial Accounting Tutorial at midday on Tuesday. Oh heck, we'll just have to miss that in order to create a two hour lunch break. Helen 2 got a phone call from Phil last night. He still can't make up his mind & she's decided that she really can't be bothered to be hanging around and waiting. She's going to see him next weekend, but mainly in order to do an impression of Pickfords Removal & in order to claim the money he owes her.

After lunch I caught the train from East Croydon to Victoria. I then got a Victoria Line train to Euston. Oh my god, that line is dreadful - I keep getting it on Friday afternoons, & it keeps being absolutely jam packed with very little ventilation. I was wondering whether I would get to Euston in time for the three o'clock train, or whether I would have to hang around for the four o'clock. Well, I just managed to get the three o'clock train although I didn't stand a hope in hell's chance of a smoking seat. So I got a seat in a non-smoker and bobbed up every now again for a cigarette. I spent the time listening to music and reading Cosmopolitan, as well as scribbling down some thoughts for the novel. When I got to Piccadilly I happened to get off right by the escalator to the bridge, and didn't have long to wait for a train to Sale.

When I got home I spent most of the time listening to Mother prat on about things. She didn't really say a great deal of import, but I sort of listened. I also learnt that the ANC has been unbanned in South Africa, which is really quite amazing, perhaps a result of what has happened in Eastern Europe & all of this is down to Gorbachev.

Derby Day

Well I laid in most of the morning. After lunch I tuned into Piccadilly. It's the second half now, incidentally in the Rugby England have won in Paris. But I really can't control this any longer - it sounds beautiful the singing, even on the radio, you can hear it coming through "And it's Man United, Man United FC, we're by far the greatest team the world has ever seen." Once again, I'm deifying Clayton Blackmore.

But City equalised. So United don't rise in the table. But at least we're outside the relegation zone. Most matches in the South were called off because of torrential rain; yet it was dry in Manchester.

At about four o'clock - or perhaps earlier - I decided that I wouldn't return to Essex this evening, but, instead, leave it until tomorrow. I had tried to reserve a seat over the phone yesterday, but you have to do it person. So it was so windy today that I really couldn't be bothered to go out to Timperley Station to do it. And then I got totally turned off by the idea of the usual Sunday rush for seats. So I begged Mother to let me stay another evening - she didn't seem to mind, so I spent the rest of the evening reading the Guinness Book of Hit Singles and watching a bit of TV eg Mastermind.

A pretty good day with everything going to plan - except my inability to get out of bed. But I did eventually. I had a quick look at the Guardian - well, the football bit. That was quite cheering. They reckon that Charlton Athletic are more or less doomed for the drop, and Luton Town have lost their ability to win even on their plastic pitch and without away fans (and I don't think anybody will be sorry to see them go down), so, in reality there's only one relegation place left. A major test of that will be Millwall v Manchester United on Saturday (3rd and 4th from bottom). I guess if one team wins, it's curtains for the other and that's quite heavy. I guess I'll just have to wait and see. Of course I didn't quite understand at the time but just four weeks earlier I had been there when Mark Robins' goal at Nottingham Forest had signalled the start of, well, everything...!

I caught the bus to Altrincham, from where I got a train to Piccadilly. I arrived there at twenty five to one, a fifty minute journey into Manchester. I caught the one o'clock train to London - comfortably. And it was comfortable. I had two seats, and half a table to myself. I read the Independent and finished AJP Taylor's History of World War One while listening to my boogie box.

Would you believe it but the train actually arrived at Euston six minutes early. From there the journey home was almost hassle free - I guess you can't expect everything in one day - so guess what - the escalator at Bank-Monument wasn't working. Sometimes I wonder whether it would be better to walk to Euston Square and get the Circle Line from there. But the journey from Fenchurch Street was good - I got the four o'clock train which only stops at Barking, Basildon, Benfleet, Leigh and Chalkwell before Westcliff, so that was pleasant. And then there was a gorgeous sunset over Chalkwell - a red sky illuminating the mudflats at low tide - I really wished that I had had my camera.

And when I got home I opened my post, the most interesting being a card and letter from Lisa. I also checked my answerphone. To my delight I had three messages. Two were from Helen, and the middle one from Justin expressing disgust that I have an answerphone.

My twenty second birthday!

A day that started badly but got progressively better. Would you believe it but I found it difficult getting out of bed on my birthday - is that a sign of old age - or is it simply a sign of living on my own. The post came, but the only thing I got was an urgent message from Britannia saying that one album I ordered was out of stock. So that was a brilliant start to the day.

Then the train journey was a bit shambolic. Well, it was okay but I had to fork out for a new travelcard, which has gone up in price to £42.40, & then the train came so I didn't have time to get a newspaper - but no problem - I read Adrian Mole on the train.

Simply Red

I have quite a few albums by Simply Red. I know they are regarded as the epitome of naffness nowadays, but when I were a lass they were cool. To be honest - as you may have noticed - I don't really care about the 'image' of the band. what matters is what they do to my ears.

First up, because of the alphabet, is Blue. I have to admit that I haven't exactly been listening with full concentration. However, nothing about it has grabbed me. I think it is the most recent one of theirs that I own, and it is probably the reason why I haven't subsequently bought any more. There is not one track on this album that leaps out and grabs me. I can only conclude that it is way too mellow, too bland, and artistically weak. I am not sure whether to classify it as 'dinner party music' or 'coffee table music'. Either way, it is designed to be used as aural wallpaper. Indeed, the only track that is slightly memorable is The Air That I Breathe, and I only noticed that for its brave attempt at reinterpreting a classic that has been covered far better by the very great kd lang.

So Simply Red's Blue is consigned to the dustbin of oblivion...

However, their Greatest Hits is vastly more enjoyable. A really good combination of self-penned and covers. I am not, on the whole, a big fan of covers, but, in general, Simply Red had a gift for uncovering and covering obscure but good songs,  and doing it with a touch of class.

Whenever I hear 'The Right Thing' I am always shocked at how explicit the lyrics are. Not because I'm a fey prude but because I do not recall any kerfuffle when this was out as a single. I do not recall it being banned from Radio One, or any outrage from the moral guardians of TOTP-watchers. 

Your Mirror epitomises the very best of Simply Red. On first few hearings it really doesn't seem very memorable or that appealing, but the more one listens the more it creeps under your skin and wraps itself around you. In place of a tune it has some sophisticated harmonies that complement intelligent lyrics. Indeed it surprises me how popular they are (or were) with the unwashed masses, I would have thought they would have gone above their heads. Or maybe it wasn't the Great Unwashed but just loads and loads of reasonably intelligent  people.

Holding Back the Years was the song that first turned me onto Simply Red. In Lower Sixth they had a blitzkreig advertising campaign for an appearance - at the Boardwalk? - and extracts from this song just kept playing and playing. So - perhaps by popular demand - the DJs presenters started playing the actual single. And just about twenty years later it still sounds as fresh as it did then.
The same can be said for "Money's Too Tight To Mention"

Fairground is another insidious into-the-bloodstream song. There is something about the way the incessant drum beat drives the song forward unrelentingly,  contrasted with Mick's diva-ish twiddles "And I love the thought of coming home to you.." The strss should be on the 'thought', by putting it on the 'love' it transforms what might have been an everyday melody into something special.

The liner booklet is a pleasant 12-page glossy, featuring song lyrics and plenty of pictures of Mick Hucknall. During one of my 'Single Desperately Seeking Someone' phases I opined that Mick Hucknall ought to be my ideal man - rich, left-wing Manchester United fan. But my friend John suggested that if those were my criteria I ought to go for Alex Ferguson. I conceded he had a point; I've never fancied Mick Hucknall.

You know, I had quite forgotten, or maybe never knew, just how good Simply Red were at their very best. Not just in, nice singalong song, but in their sophisticated mix of rhythm, melody, harmony, and lyrics. That Mick Hucknall is technically very very good. I am making a great big mental note to play this album an awful lot more than I normally do.

There will be more Simply Red when I reach them alphabetically in cassettes...

I would be interested to know the views of commenters and lurkers on Simply Red.

Keighley, racist hotbed

Blame it on the Asians

I know someone who works in Keighley, at the front line of public service delivery - although, obviously, he lives in a posh area out of town. I must ask him about this.

What am I going on about?

If you haven't a clue what the two below posts are about, it's the Troubled Diva which decade is tops for pops? - scroll down the sidebar to 'we played...'

And it starts up again this week...

I still won't know any of the Naughties' Songs.
And I know it will be a toss up between the 60s and the 80s.