Arthur's Journal

According to some Cinderella didn't start off having glass slippers - oh no - they were squirrel fur. This was a transcription mistake, from the French vair to verre. (Snopes says this is a myth, others disagree; it's not a discussion I'm about to get into.)

Neither of them sound like the kind of thing you'd want to wear to a ball.

But it did make me think about all those cyber-Cinderellas who've been turning up to goth nights all over the country. Maybe modern-day Cinders is allowed to stay out till 4am and get trashed on ketamine with her handsome prince. Young people, these days...

In lieu of some proper posting - which should follow tomorrow - I'll leave you with some picspam in the manner of those altered posters I used to see around Leeds in the '80s.

Cruel, but true.

Major hat tip to Simon srk1; good to see him back.

Just a thought : If Tesco recently had to withdraw one of their Christmas cards due to its being gratuitously offensive towards redheads, then why is Dr Who allowed to insult us with impunity?

I wish I'd been able to watch DW in time to provide some kind of review, as my fingers are itching to get to grips with RTDs excruciatingly protracted love letter to DT. However, I only saw the concluding episode tonight and so will content myself with a couple of salient points :-

1. Bernard Cribbins. A knighthood in the next Honours List please.

2. John Simm. I so would.

I shall be watching the new series of DW with interest. But I have to say, early indications are not auspicious (unless you are drawn to the concept of DW - The Indie Years).

Good news: SUZUKI FUCKING ROCKS. Located poor little car under truck size drift of snow - not towed away or run into, thank gad, but unmoved since c 17th December I think. IT STARTED FIRST TIME. In my next life I want to be Japanese :) Bet they laug at prolapsed discs.. (I haven't actually moved it anywhere - is there any point? Even my physio who lives about a mile uphill from me,  said on no account to come by car as it was "deadly").

Bad news: it is going to be MINUS 21 OVERNIGHT in parts of Sctland tonight (near Fort William in fact, Kirsten!). I DON'T WANT TO LIVE IN VLADIVOSTOK. Stop the madness!

Excellent news : I don't actually have to go anywhere

Shit news: But I do have to mark an exam.

Today's factoids: Merlin was half human. Did everyone but me know that? Also David Tennant's dad was a minister of the C of S . I think this explains a lot actually.

Ongoing Oodacity: What's the worst pun YOU can make up using the word "Ood"?

Sheffield weather: how bad IS it there? I was a bit amazed today to get an email with an offer of emergecy overnigt accommodation for members of staff..

That question meme thing. Go on,ask me 4 questions. I'm in, I'm bored and I've momentarily got at least 42 braincells.

Ah it only takes a crisis and they come running back to LJ from twitter shaking their tails in apology eh? :-)

Oh yeh hopeless plea: Please GOD someone put me on a dr Who panel at Eastercon ? :))

Just had to report that tonight kvlt_kitty  and I decided that Oods probably wear Uggs. And if they then hung out on street corners clutching their ASBOs (AntiStellar Behaviour Orders of course) would that make them 'Oodies? (A very John Simms look of course!)

Yes I have made it back to Embra with all my limbs intact!! And even been visited! Wow, it's almost like actual life!

Am now reunited with my own Freeview Tivo thingy so have watched the Dr Who Never Mind The Buzzcocks special. OMG how stoned was Catherine Tate?! And how sexy is DT at full length in his own accent? And (extra marks for this question) how could he be the ONLY sexy man ever to come out of Bathgate?? sneerpout  , you definitely get first go at answering this one!

So. Home. Tomorow must mark those effing exams. After that all is vague and unsure and full of cosmic dust and Dr Who videos. Ring me. Let's do lunch!

To lj user=<"kissmeforlonger">. A true friend. May 2010 bring you nothing but good things :-)

Some Sunday morning memeage for you; questions from clytemenstra, who knows I won't turn her down;

1. Who do you consider to be the greatest prog-rock legend, and why?

Now I could get all Maconie on you here and start filling the page with eulogies about Francesco di Giacomo from Banco del Mutuo Soccorso or Marián Varga from Collegium Musicum, but I won't because you're unlikely ever to have heard of them unless you're a) Italian, b) Czechoslovak, or c) ortho_bob. So I'm narrowing it down to two men who consistently made music that even the mickeymaoist cultural determinists at the NME couldn't impeach; the intense, operatic Peter Hammill of Van der Graaf Generator and the ever-innovative Robert Fripp of King Crimson. Hammill scores a bajillion kudos points for being John Lydon's favourite singer of all time, but the Crimso King just pips him by dint of overcoming working with handicaps like Pete Sinfield's lyrics and John Wetton's voice AND re-inventing how to play the guitar. Plus Bob has been Mr Toyah Willcox for some years now, giving hope to beardy old letches everywhere.

2. What disgusts you most about the current state of British politics?

The constant supplication to the military-industrial complex and the tabloids, the endless salami-slicing of civil liberties in the name of "security", and the voting system by which the electorate are encouraged to vote for the puppet on the left or the one on the right instead of voting to get rid of the puppeteer upon whose hands they sit. Much talk of "change", never any action to do so. But then, there are too many sod-you-I'm-all-right-Jack people out there pacified by consumerism and cheerfully swallowing the lies they've been spoonfed.

3. Do you think the internet was the greatest invention of the 20th Century?

It's a truly great one (though whether Sir Tim deserves to take his place alongside Watt and Bell and Faraday is a moot point, given that ARPAnet and many other networks including Usenet were around before the WWW came along) but you've got to go all the way back to Marconi's invention of radio for the real groundbreaker in terms of mass communication. Without it, there'd have been neither a medium nor a message, unless the rather steampunk solutions that the Hungarians (among others) once used for broadcasting had caught on (and from this, you can work out that the telephone would have trumped radio had Bell not been a quarter of a century too early).

4. What is the worst book you've ever read?

I stand by my steadfast belief that The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play by Ben Watson was an unnecessary, mindless massacre of innocent trees of Kronstadt proportions, as I've explained here and here.

5. What colour is Thursday?

Belgium.

If anyone wants five bespoke questions of their own, please comment...

.but I couldn't re watch or watch DWC cos my bro is watching another channel on the Sky box..

( Read more... )

Good poll here..

http://londonkds.livejournal.com/380286.html

Happy 2010 to you all! Here's a post that *doesn't* contain any Dr Who-based content.

Forget Antony Gormley's angels, the people at the top of the fourth plinth, and Diana's Drain in Hyde Park; everyone knows that the greatest piece of public art ever to have been built in Britain in modern times[1] was the fibreglass statue of King Kong that once stood between the old Bull Ring and the Rotunda in the otherwise ghastly brutalist city centre of 1970s Birmingham, home of Cliff Richard's Brumburgers[2], described by Telly Savalas as "my kinda town", and chronicled by me here a couple of years ago. Sadly, Kong did not co-star with Kojak in that one, having already been shipped off to a garage in Sparkbrook, and a few years back I heard that the giant ape had been removed and destroyed, presumably melted down and recycled as cavity wall insulation. However, as any Toho Studios film fan knows you can't keep a good monster down for very long so I was delighted to find out that not only is Kong alive but he's still looking as magnificent as ever, first having shown up in Edinburgh and currently being the biggest thing to terrorise Penrith since Withnail demanded to have some booze.

A little perturbing, though, to find out the sculpture's new owners are an outfit called Spook Erection[3]. Oo-er, missus. Relax. though; Kong is anatomically incorrect!

[1] - give or take the Superlambananas of Liverpool
[2] - one of Sir Clifford's co-stars in Take Me High was our Maddy, hence the purely gratuitous use of the icon.
[3] - which not only brings to mind Edward Cullen slash as you'd expect, but for me its moniker echoes a charmingly-named Rotherham-based road construction company known to the world as Slag Reduction.

has actually been proofing my niece's law essay on the ius commune.

But I think I will now rewatch Dr Who: the end, part one, in prep for tonight. Anyone else want to sing along?


Poll #1505819
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 28

So..

..and..

How soon is now?

Which of these words mean the same thing? Tick all that do

Why, where, and when? Do not write on both sides of the paper at once.

Some are series, some episodes.. not in order, that would be too difficult.

Dr Who: Blink  (a tough one, vying with the Human Nature two parter - but..)

Black Books : all of it, best comedy of the decade, forget the bloody Office, but especially the party episode where Dylan Moran tries to sing Irish and Bill Bailey completely fails to notice a woman is desperately trying to get off with him

Green Wing: the comedy surreal genius experiment of the decade. Why has this been so relentlessly ignored in the decade lists? Every single person in it has gone on to be a star.

The Book Group - ditto. Especially the ep in series two where the two footballers wives couples decide, with sub titles, they should try having an orgy. Also memorable for the simple classic line re baby clothes: "they're not cute... they're just SMALL". See also Festival, New Town (viva Nardini)

Ballet Shoes - the adaptation from Xmas 2008. Just wonderful. Fuck your crinoline period crap..

Coupling , , all of it but especially Lesbian Spank Inferno! Pre-Who Moffat, the most perfect farce plotting ever.

Torchwood Children of earth  - yes, really.  Really!

The Thick of It : pure fucking incendiary genius

IT Crowd : either the Friendface episode or the German cannibal  ep. Second best comedy series of the decade, but only by a fraction.

Buffy - of course. For an episode, either end season 5, end season 7, or Restless

Honorary mentions:
Heroes,  season 1 finale . We forget how damn good that first series was. Superheroes on tv for real. And the tension!
That Victoria Wood drama about the WWII housewife set in Barrow in Furness ;
Arnando Iannuci's sketch on how  Tescos invades Norway . Still makes me giggle uncontrollably everytime I think about it.
Life on Mars , series 2 finale  especially
Wallace and Gromett
Never Mind The Buzzcocks  w Simon Amstell only OF COURSE, esp the one with Amy Winehouse pissed as a fart
Top gear in Alabama.ie the one  with "man love" decor on the cars
Skins (1st 2 series only):  s 1 ep 1;  or series 2 campus episode (the one which is almost cerainly entirely a hallucination) - best and origin of the new wave of yoof (sur)realism; see also MisFits
Spaced, series 2, the  Matrix episode
Spooks, esp the Diana conspiracy episode but any with the original "Tom" ie Matthew McFadyen - best thriller drama of the decade
House - of course!
Secret Life of Us - I *think* this sneaks into the decade at least for when I saw it? if not when made in Oz. Most grown up, literate and real "soap" of any continent's offerings.
Six Feet Under and True Blood - real auteur work
and,finally,  probably some of Lost - notably season 1 and the last but one so far - for seriously clever headfuckery with time lines and coincidences which were NOT, as the glib quickly assumed, simply made up on the fly.

The Guardian film team's pick of the top 100 movies of the decade. Check back from 21 December as we unveil the top 10 day by day
100 best films of the noughties: Nos 11-100 | Film | guardian.co.uk

Well., Jesus, if anything I'm even less impressed with this lot than the TV ones. I watch a LOT of movies, at least till last couple years,  and I've only seen 20 out of these 100. Well, OK, fair enough, but even of the rest there were only about another 20 I even **WANTED** to see. It's stuffed full of foreign langauage suicide inducing wanky obscurama  that only came to one cinema in Hampstead for 48 hours, basically, just to show how arsey the critic is. It's a cross between lit-come and KTF. Oh how 80s! Also, just let me point to one choice: Before Sunrise - well, words fail me really.  Thank Christ for Team America and Eternal Sunshine anyway (tho where Being John Malkovich, huh??)

I suppose this means I should at least try to construct maybe at least my own top 20 of the decade, since arguably films are the last cultural artifact, or perhaps just thing, in the world I do care about. You'd probably prefer it to My Top 20 Internet Law Cases of the Last Decade (though now you come to mention it... perhaps for another blog. Maybe I am after all beginning to rediscover how to enjoy agony free indolence..).

Btw I've already seen at least one person complain we shouldn't be doing "bests of decades" because the decade didn't start till 2001. Jesus fucking christ man, didn't we go through all this pointless arse clenching ten years ago? Next person who even dares raise the subject risks imposition of forced clitoridectomy even if (especially in fact if) male. Yes, Malcolm Tucker still rules.

*And* I didn't tape the last ep of The Thick Of IT *and* it doesnt seem to be on any type of i-Player/Virgin catch up thingy. Bloody Bah Bloody Bumbag. (Yes the opiates really HAVE worn off haven't they? Gosh almost like Being Human..)*

*some of the writing of this entry may have been influenced by reading Charlie Brooker blog  catch ups..

From GRauniad:

Let us know your favourite TV moments of the decade

Which were the best episodes of the noughties? If you were going to watch anything again from the last decade of TV, which shows would you choose to rewind? Here are 10 of our favourites to get you going (some of which contain swearing and/or violence and may be unsuitable for younger viewers). Feel free to jump in below with your suggestions
What are the best TV episodes of the noughties? | Television & radio | guardian.co.uk

Yes, more comment whoring. This is what happens when opiates aren't knocking you  out at 9pm every night I guess...

But bloody hell, I've only seen 2 of these and I bet you can guess at least one of them!! I do not think it is a mark of excellence simply that there are no episodes of the Wire within, as one critic sourly suggested :-) I defy  at least loveandgarbage  to devise a better list than this..

Beeb on salting and gritting by householders,,

"There has also been a brisk trade in cat litter, which can be used as an alternative to grit, with Sainsbury's reporting a rise of 20% compared to this time last year."

Jesus, I have enough trouble getting it at best of times! well at the price, bet they ain't using CatSan from Waitrose...

There are interesting comments here both in the main post and the comment thread, raising and defending certain "white privilege" and "noble savage" aspects of the Avatar plot which have come in for much crit.  I for one think it would have made no difference at all if the Terran protagonist had been of colour not white but it is an interesting question. But I remain unconvinced by the basic analogy:

( spoliers )


Is it more than coincidence that the debate around the two most interesting sf / alien movies of the year, District 9 and Avatar, has in each case centred on "white privilege"/"why can only a white man save the day?"?

EDIT: This is  a really interesting account of a very early Cameron draft of whatbecame Avatar - worth reading. The most interesting bit for me is that it removes wat is for me the major plot hole in the spoiler cut above - so why the change? Hmm. %o keep the "asset stripping the rainforest to build McDonalds boxes" vibe? Probably.

Even in the season of goodwill to all men, one can reliably trust the Daily Mail to come out with the very worst in knee-jerk racist faux outrage, and this article by their new signing from the Express Leo McKinstry on the subject of the cold-blooded execution of poor, deluded Akmal Shaikh by the Chinese occupying authorities in East Turkestan is a prime example. One wonders what the reaction of the tabloids and how half-hearted the efforts of HMG to save his life would have been had his name been something like "Alan Smith"; compare and contrast, for instance, the Kenny Richey case in Ohio. McKinstry has form as long as your arm as you'd expect from a former Express man, and this bloodthirsty op-ed is particularly egregious of its type (and WTF this case has to do with "crime-ridden, welfare-dependent [...] housing estates" Allah only knows), but the reason I flag it up is because of the poll that's on the page, which I encourage those of you on Twitter to retweet as far and wide as possible. Of course it will not bring Akmal Shaikh back, but there's always a certain amount of pleasure giving the Mail a smack in its foam-flecked, gibbering, ugly mouth. Fuck you McKinstry, and fuck the scabby horse you rode in on.

Brighter news elsewhere in the world as England press on towards victory in the Durban Test, with another of those scratchy centuries that Belly always seems to contrive to pull out of the fire when he needs to, followed by Swanny bowling like Captain Marvel yet again. Surely even England can't chuck this one away?