Sorry.

I’m writing like a capering fool at the moment! And reading. I’m reading Bond books! James Bond books. They’re pretty aces, and have great covers, too.

I didn’t think I’d enjoy them, but, well, I was wrong. They’re tough, sparse little thrillers. I’d love to see them made as movies, and that isn’t a jokey sentence. I really would like to see them made as they are, hard-boiled and vicious. Bond gets the shit kicked out of him quite regularly. No gadgets. The girls are characters in their own right (and, though he is obviously an arse, he does seem to care for them, in a gruff sort of way). They’d be lovely little films. But no. Big old effects-heavy wink-at-the-camera juggernauts thunder through our cinemas at regular intervals.

Wonder when that happened?

Done it! Seen The Breeders live! You’ve no idea how long I’ve waited for that. But anyway, ’tis done and it was so very good that I’m not sure even italics do the job. So good! Nah, you know, this isn’t going to be solved by typefaces.

Damn, it’s a long way to Blackheath. I mean, we’re not talking the Peak District here, but in London terms it might as well be on Mars. But if they were playing a couple of special gigs on Mars I might make the effort, so there you go. I think there’s probably an equation somewhere which goes on about how difficult getting to a gig is being related to how awesome it actually in in the end. I mean, if that’s the case then the support band did some good work to making the wait even more unendurable. Imagine, if you will, a guitar solo lasting five minutes. Now imagine a bass solo lasting that long. And a drum solo. With two drummers. Now DOUBLE THE LENGTH OF TIME AND PLAY THEM ALL AT THE SAME TIME. Congratulations, you’ve imagined one song by the support band. And they were on for forty five fucking minutes! My head was beginning to complain about my impacted ears digging in to it by the time they were done.

…..short wait while roadies test a billion types of guitar……

Then they were there! Lookit! It was, like, The Breeders! Kim and Kelley and some other people that I don’t know the names of right there! We were promised the classic Last Splash lineup, but Jim was apparently busy with something – luckily the drummer that was there (who may or may not have been Jose Medeles) was really great so no complaints. Distinct lack of Josephine Wiggs for the first few songs, but when a band comes on and plays No Aloha followed by Little Fury who gives a fuck who’s playing as long as Kim Deal is singing? But then, somewhat unexpectedly, the bassist dropped back and in came a very fucked-off Josephine Wiggs. Maybe she’d been caught in traffic, or something. Her mood did not improve for the entire gig despite the onstage levity enjoyed by everyone else. Oh, well, no helping some people.

One person who was definitely enjoying herself was Kelley, who was all smiles and chatter. Her moment of confusion before launching into I Just Wanna Get Along was endearing beyond belief, especially when Kim became very supportive and stroked her arm until she got better – at which point Kelley suddenly realised what was being asked of her and exclaimed “Oh, that one! That one’s easy!” And she made it seem so.

A relatively sedate crowd – hey, we’re all too old for a proper mosh pit – came alive at points in the show (the aforementioned I Just Wanna Get Along and Little Fury, Divine Hammer, Son of Three, Huffer (complete with “Daaa da da da dada etc” crowd singalong) and, of course, the mighty Cannonball to name a few), bouncing as merrily as our aged knees would allow. But, you know, we weren’t so much there for the dancing as the listening. We were a respectful crowd – except for the slightly overfamiliar heckling. Apparently a lot of people love Kim.

A few guest musicians breezed in and out. Josephine Wiggs didn’t stay for every song – just as well, ’cause she was harshing everyone’s buzz – Carrie Bradley was the anti-Wiggs, so cheery and smiley for her violin parts. A chap who I have ascertained may have been Michael Allen came on and groaned through Oh!, which was entertainingly novel. Sod his real name, henceforth he is “The Groaner”. All in all there was a sense of a band having a good time and playing some old favourites (quite a few Pod tracks and I think Amps stuff, too) with the original musicians. Which isn’t to say that it was, you know, like you’ve gone to see the Stones churning out the classics by rote. A lot of crowd-pleasers, but enough leftfield stuff that you felt it was worth being there rather than just putting the albums on REALLY LOUD at home.

Well, only another 10 years before my next gig, then…

Quite right, too. If I wanted to experience the real world, I’d go outside. My favourite games on my GameCube are Zelda: Wind Waker and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Neither of which look like they are set in a built-up area.

raaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!

One week to The Breeders. Chances are, you’re not going. Hahahaha! Oh, god, I’m sorry. Still, I didn’t get to see The Pixies…

God, I haven’t been to a gig for years. Do I still need to drink cider?

Hi folks! I have no reason to be typing this blog entry other than I feel bad if I’ve not posted for a while.

It was Hallowe’en, as well you know, last Monday. We got trick-or-treaters by the bucketload. Initially our big bowl o’ sweeties drew “Oooh”s and “Wow”s from the little extortioners, but by the end it was a bit “Er.. is that it?” *rummage* *rummage*. I was getting worried we’d be reduced to handing out fruit, thus legitimately setting ourselves up as “trick targets”. Kids firebomb shit these days, you know.

There are pictures of our pumpkin somewhere on this computer. It’ll turn up sometime. It was shit-scary.

I photoshopped teddy bears into The Shining for a pub quiz picture round. Now go and look at them because I like people looking at stuff I did that I am proud of.

On an unrelated note, two people in my life have bad things going on with the backs of their eyes. One may be far worserer than the other. It’s a bit of a weird coincidence.

When is gmail (or, as we must probably call it forthwith, googlemail) going public? I’ve had a gmail account since forever – being a Blogger has its advantages, no doubt. But it’s still invite only. I mean, it’s not hard to get an invite – hell, throw a brick and you hit two googlemail invites rushing at you – but it does seem an odd strategy. It presents googlemail as something for those in the know, those in the loop. It’s also obvious to those inside that it’s anything but. You want a googlemail account? Gimme your normal, boring, standard email address and watch the invites rush in.

So the air of exclusivity gives them cachet from outside, but the apparent lack of it inside devalues the scrabble to get the address. They don’t need this, googlemail is good enough without cheap lifestyle tricks.

It should be open, like lesser mail services. Like Hotmail, which was my first email account just at the very second it was bought by Microsoft. I felt like I’d established some presence on the internet – without anyone having to bring me in from the cold, I was an adventurer setting out with 2mb of inbox and an address with a number in it. Google is stifling that frontier spirit with its “Others have it, and only they can give it to you”.

Or, you know, maybe they don’t want spammers getting googlemail accounts. But if just one spammer gets googlemail, it’ll replicate like a virus. So why bother? I can’t see a single effective argument for keeping it invite-only. And I can’t stand typing googlemail.

Anyway, like I say. You want gmail? Ask. For now.

I don’t know how many of you have been following the wacky japes of Mr Jack Thompson, Attorney at Law. There are so many funderful links I don’t know where to start. Well, hell, let’s start with his own stuff, the hilariously poor* site stopkill.com (which a quick whois tells me is AVAILABLE TO BUY, so kick that damn squatter out!). And the best links are probably at the bottom of the Wikipedia page, which I don’t have to link for you, I’m sure. Currently fighting with Penny Arcade (who are all over the high ground, he’s Anakin – they are Obi-Wan), he’s also had run-ins with Scott of VG Cats and pretty much anyone who may have once designed, funded, played or even heard of a videogame.

I mean, Sims 2. Fer fuck’s sake. If there’s a more conservative, family-oriented videogame in the world, I’d like to see it. Yes, they’re naked under the blur. So am I. And they have the sex. Again, I think a lot of people do that one, too. But not in so wholesome a manner as the Sims. There’s some grinning, a moving blanket and some cuddling. Shocking, I’m sure you’ll agree. And as for it being Advance Paedo Simulator – what shite. It’s not like you can fuck the kids. You can give them a hearty breakfast and send them off to school, hoping they’ll come back with an A+ grade, though. It’s a nightmare scenario, I’m sure you’ll agree, and one which we need to stop children imitating! Oh, man, I got a bit mixed up with my rhetoric there. Still, eh, so does Jack, so do we all.

Still, credit where due. The batshit crazy bastard sure is entertaining.

* The Google result alone tells you how much effort was put into it, it’s symptomatic of his slapdash approach.

I just went to make a cup of coffee – instant coffee, I’m not a snob I can drink it fine – but I went for the coffee pods.

I should point out here that our espresso machine is completely boss. Check it out. Click on “light blue” to see the exact colour we have. I use it whenever possible, it makes gorgeous frothed milk and the coffee is, naturally, fab. But to open a tin of coffee pods when you’re boiling a kettle? Maybe that’s when you’ve gone too far down a certain road. Perhaps I should step back, because it’s not going to be there all the time. What if I’m on holiday? I don’t want to be one of those people who says “Oh, daahhhhlink, I can’t possibly drink instant coffee! You must bring me espresso or I shall diiiie“. Because punching yourself in the throat hurts.

genuineghost
Originally uploaded by RandomMoth.

This is a GENUINE GHOST that is VERY SCARY and should make you CRAP YOURSELF SILLY.

I heart the inter-net.