30 November 2010

DYLAN'S GUITARS

I have ogled and envied every one of Dylan's guitars as they've appeared on his LP covers.

This is my kind of article and I've read it through twice even before leaping to post it.

My mother holds - and repeats often and repeatedly with many a duplicated duplication - that certain gardening articles are so well written that one doesn't even have to be 'interested' in gardening to enjoy and read them with pleasure.

Even my brother slams that idiot jardinerie vanity as steaming night-soil bullshit of the pungentest poop plop:

If a hobby ain't your hobby,

IT AIN'T YOUR FUCKING HOBBY

(Geddit?!)

No faluting wordage is going to lift it from dead dull ashes on the page.

I cite examples in her case of handbooks on HTML, recording techniques, the finer points of Tascam gadgetry; stamp collecting and Revel kit construction; home brewing ~ but she shrugs and mutters.

This article is a good example of horses for courses, but we're talking vile gardenry so wazza the point?

Highway 61 - a little bonus

BRAND'S brand

shy-making passes by That Man

29 November 2010

MINI CARLOS

Takes some nerve performing Samba before the Maestro.

Takes un peu de technique, to boot.

NIGEL KENNEDY

Or Nige', as I suspect he likes to be known.

Heard of him? I hadn't, but what a pretentious twonker.

I had BBC TV on silent and came in with my peanuts and coquetail du soir and there was this hideous sight. Ugh.

OK, I thought, one of those worthy documentaries showing how a distracting hobby can help lift even the most afflicted above mere physical setbacks - in this case, a nasty case of keratosic psoriasis.

Not to be thought squeamish, I turned up the vol.

A charitable orchestra - dressed prawperly - was allowing some scruff with a bad case of St Vitus to scrape along.

He finished with a flourish and tell-tale swivel-eyed preening. Then, to my consternation for their hygienic wellbeing, Baldilocks proceeded to snog the dishier violinistas, who had clearly been alerted because they didn't even flinch as Kenners he homed in with his plucked-chicken bonce.

Then followed an 'interview' which he fielded with the most excruciating faux working-class accent, using pretentious vocab such as gig, chops, axe and other Hendrixian blabber to describe the music.

Unfortunately for Rosin le Beau, I had him busted bang to rights, having once met his parents: they speak with perfectly acceptable educated accents. So whence cometh our Noige's strangled Higginsonian vow'z?

I couldnt tell if he fiddled any good, like, but *he* clearly thought so from his giggly cavortings; the orchestra was a model of tact, delivering rictus smiles all round.

Don't get me wrong: I'm all for these rehabilitation programmes - whatever gets people on their feet and back into society - but to broadcast the process on a public network, and a family one, to boot?

I confess I ogled the spectacle to the end but not without an uncomfortable feeling of voyeurism spiced with a guilty dollop of armchair cruelty.

RONNIE MOIPOLAI

Botswana Busking

  • Deft.
  • Interesting left hand.
  • Dude over her left shoulder heard it all before, he just wants 2 suck on his beer
  • Wouldn't mind her rhythmic right-hand plectrum sprightliness either.
  • 27 November 2010

    FRIGHTENING THE HORSES

    Sir Paul Stephenson

    "I was at the debrief last night, there was no reference to that whatsoever and I have no reference to it."

    Walking Gee-gees - The Trots

    "I can't comment on the operation itself, except to say I would urge people to see the video for themselves and judge the comment about charging into the crowd.

    And anybody who knows anything about equestrian activities will see perhaps a trot followed by walking horses."

    Wot horses? Wot charge?

    OLLIE MOORE

    ~ Life 'ruined', mum enraged ~


    I love this photo. I've poured myself an early vin blanc et kir and lit a delicious Karelia as I savour the scene.

    Nor do I know which quote to headline and in which order of satisfaction to place them:

    • "... claimed his life had been 'ruined' and that his mother was enraged"
    • " ... travelled to London for a job interview ... spoke of regret and fears he will never be able to get a job."

    Har har har - ^5, you stoopid little fucker.

    Look at that baby face, almost too fresh to try that snarly gnarly expression.

    And do look at that defiant middle finger?

    FFS, children, what's wrong with a good old True Blue patriotic V-sign? No sense of tradition or history, les jeunes these days.

    Oh but the quotes! Wonderful wonderful quotes, hinting at real disharmony and disappointment, thwarted plans and come-uppance.

    • Oliver Moore (17) alumnus of Thamesmead School, Shepperton
    • Former employee of Natterjacks, couturiers of Kingston ... "This has ruined my life"
    • "My mum went crazy ... don’t think I’ve done my job prospects much good."
    • "Didn’t know the protest was due to take place ... wearing a smart shirt for my interview."

      Absolutely hilarious. Crackerjack Natterjack chemise for his close-up, he means.

    • "On my own and just joined up with the crowd ... saw a police riot helmet on the ground and put it on to give the cameramen a picture."
    Bravo!! And is that there the picture? Must be - says it all:
  • Job forfeit
  • Family furore
  • Folly-fuddled thickness confirmed
  • Hopes dashed
  • CV blemished
  • ... pray God the list goes on as the reptile press reel out their own snaps and sniggers.

    What raises my spirits is how many similar stories will emerge from the identifying photos and meedja coverage with yet more hooligans biting the dust. Yee haWW.

  • Moore's Mouth: Ollie the Wally's burblings should be read aloud at the beginning of each job interview and in the hearing of the other applicants.

    "He was photographed in front of a vandalised police van.

    Protesters had covered it with graffiti, smashed the windows and climbed on the roof before breaking in and removing police equipment.

    It emerged today that Mr Moore only got caught up in the chaos after coming to London for a job interview."

    OR RATHER ...

    'Cool. I'm making good time. Always looks organised and keen to turn up slightly early - might be forms to fill in.

    Ayup, sounds like a bit of aggro going on over there - never a dull moment in the Smoke.

    Ungghh - wot's this force pulling me off my route? Got to resist ... mum would kill me ... my best shirt ... can't let me bird down ... unhhh ... running late, yobs and ASBOs on top of van, keep my nose clean ... slip in front of the van where no one'll mistake me for one of 'em ... steer clear of the chaos, grab helmet ... blimey, photographers ... got nuffink for them to snap, poor bastards ... over here! this better? Finger and scowl? Wannna hear some effing n blinding?

    Phew, that was close ... always keep a low profile, is best.'

    Jailbait on the march! Oliver better look to his juvie laurels.

  • 25 November 2010

    SMOKERY POKERY

    Ever since that Cassandra Nevada vixen cut me to the quick by pointing out that Gwyn 'Dai the Folly' ran a wittier humorous blog than moi, I've been brooding on my soggy bloggy efforts to be the new William Hickey-cum-Quentin Letts.

    She and he are right: posts should be punchy whiplash in/out observations.

    An email just in heads me in the right direction.

    A lady - literal Lady, chattel of a knight - writes to me with a memory I don't actually remember.

    Seems I was at a dinner where I'd been beefing about how people went on about jardinerie: "I don't suddenly wade in with tedious chatter about plunking a guitar, or amusing tricks with HTML, or snapping busty babes on the sly - why do 'gardening' enthusiasts feel the right to suddenly launch into their hobby without craving indulgence from any other diners who find the past-time a crashing bore.

    Ignored and shouted down, of course.

    I don't recall the incident but certainly take credit for such foolhardiness: apparently, dessert served and coffee and liqueurs circling, and still the chatter droning on about drooping daturae and wanton wisteria, I whispered a request to the butler to bring me an ashtray and proceeded to light up.

    Host:

    "Actually, Christopher, I personally don't mind if you smoke but there might be others who find the habit objectionable.

    At my table, it's customary to ask permission before lighting up."

    Nods and grunts.

    Me - look of apologetic surprise -

    "I'm terribly sorry. I personally don't object to people monopolising the conversation with tales of their hobbying but I find many others of us find it tedious after a while and are grateful for the custom of asking permission before launching into 'grandes histoires botaniques'.

    You clearly run a more relaxed table so I thought that I, too, might dispense with such starched etiquette.

    Of course, I will extinguish my cigarette herewith and we can clear the air with an equally more tolerable thread of conversation."

    My correspondent:

    "My dear, you could have heard a pin drop. In fact, I'm sure I popped more than one trying to contain my laughter.

    Anyway, I'm writing to say that I used the exact same ploy at a dinner with my husband and golf cronies and it worked a treat.

    Are you insular this Christmas as your mother visits Italy as usual? I don't know how she does it at her age. I can hardly drag myself out of bed to totter down the road to Partridges.

    Absolutely dreading the drive down to Devon ... etc"

    OK OK, still hot as an air balloon but I'm working on it.

    Dai Folly would have it nailed:

    "Blah blah, garden garden, sod this pour une alouette ... anyone got a gasper? Say what, guv'? Yachy da, beg pardon, all."

    PORG

    I was taught to refer to those of bercowian stature as Persons Of Restricted Growth.

    So? Primordial Simian? Same difference.

    Wait til they start on the wife.

    24 November 2010

    ZOE!

    Bravo Zoe Williams!

    Look at that splendid woman - that is beauty, class and mettle. That firm jaw.

    If I was a captain of industry I'd've told my ADC,

    "That woman. I don't give a tinker's cuss what she's studying - the day after she graduates, I want her in my office and we're going to talk turkey about getting her on the payroll.

    Oh, and do some very private research on her finances ... I don't want to hear any crap about her studies suffering because of mere money.

    What's that 'discreet' charity we run? That's it - get Gwyn to do his usual trick with his invisible grants."

    Oh boy, I tell you ... watching the police van being hoodlumised ... I'd've got myself a long gun - a la Day of the Jekyll - and opened my office window just enough to shoot through, cleared the paperwork from the desk and lain down to take some slow, selective shots of key bodyparts of those cavorting ruffians.

    Ankles, elbows, cartilage, ear-lobes.

    Can you imagine the reaction of the fuzz as, one second these punks are jumping up and down, spray painting and taunting them with their 'can't touch me' - the next, blown off the bonnet, hitherto useful youthful joints and sinews suddenly a blubby goo of extremities, spilling into the gutter.

    Fuzz: "What the ... ?"

    Looking up and all around like in all the movies where theyre always portrayed as real slow ... but that's no use because the soft-nose would've traveled between buildings and across the rooftops and any peripheral percussion would've evaporated upwards.

    That Miss Williams ... I'd say she should get herself a good PR except, from the cut of her jib, she looks too smartly intolerant of the wankers of my trade.

  • Video: A bitty video of the students biffing the police van, including a sound-bite from Zoe, followed by coverage of Greek police booting and roughing up protesters.
  • Guardian coverage: More rabble video incl van rocking and loadsa black faces with gorblimey accents.
  • Women and schoolkids: chaos to the streets. Sounds like my kinda movie - speaking of which, cruise the page and check out that totally hot redhead using her school tie as a bandana. Don't tell me that's some genuine pupil ... now I get it, yesterday was just a casting call for this new 'tuition' genre of movie: all this jailbait rampaging round the tourist spots of London, cool shots of various yoof making it on the roof of Parliament and on the Big Ben bell and on the Woolsack ... instant export sales.

    Comment Fail: I'm so churlish. Someone leaves a friendly comment on my Zoe post and the first thing I do is moan and bitch:

    "Interesting peace of information about the fuzz and also the pictures are really good."
    Thanks. Actually, they're not good - the second Zoe pic arrived blurred and the hot schoolgirl doesn't copy from the article, which is a huger pity than not doing Ms Williams justice.

    The comment seems to have been left by two parties:

  • A Dissertations and Proofreading service
  • A Help-in-Artice-Writing service, whose page kicks off with the pointer that,
    'The first thing to keep in mind if you want to know how to write a good article is to write articles that are informative, educational, and interesting.'

    Wrong, mate. The first thing to ensure is that you can effing SPELL.

    FFS, lads - and you're offering dissertating/editing/proofreading?

    "Peace of information"?? PEACE??

  • CHAT SUR LE BALCON

    Beg pardon to Corfucusiosi Irregulières also befriending me on facebook and who'll have seen this, but members of La Famille 'Fucius ask that I repeat the tongue-dans-cheek post here.

    "Et voici, the cover shot for the Ionian edition of Γάτα Εβδομαδιαία ('Cat Weekly', incorporating 'Moggie Monthly').

    They'd been after me for months to do a feature on our menagerie a quatre but you know how I shun such vulgar publicity.

    Then they sent along this sweet creature complete with her own Brownie 127 (which I had to show her how to operate) and she charmed me into a chatteroux.

    Elle avait du chat, on pourrait dire - oh ha ha, quel wit.

    The decisive moment came when she asked timidly,

    'Er, couldnt you get her to do something, um, 'catty'?

    Sans even looking down at her, I purred:

    'Louki - lick!'
    Voila, dead on cue, La L complied.

    You should have seen Mlle Journalista's eyes glow ... I could see her darling little mind ticking over,

    'This man ... he has such pussy power'
    Vista Note: Regard the top foto ... a little more gust to push the cloud left and I could have been wearing a beau sombrero nuageoise.

    Avrio methavrio ... She's coming back to do a featurette for Hombre & Hound.

    Ready for yer close-up, Sambo?

    23 November 2010

    JAMAYKAH HEARTBEAT

    It was my wife-2-B who introduced me to Acoustic Alchemy - literally.

    We was still courting and I fancied her like mad and she knew I, like, totally owned the guitar.

    Alors, choque horreur when she had the effrontery to hand me tickets to a select jam above a pub.

    In a pub? Cheeky! Is this really the right woman for me?

    Went along, usual pseudy bunch swilling around. Didn't look like the band had turned up and then up comes this very nice bloke, Nick, who pecks her on the cheek and shakes my hand and then we all take our seats and, damn me, if Nick doesn't unsheath a steel-string and get stuck in.

    This was their early days and I liked their sound.

    We kept missing their concerts - same as we kept missing Paco de Lucia - and then one day Steph showed me a piece in the music press that Nick had died of pancreatic cancer.

    Blow me down if one day in Seattle, there's t'band appearing at the local jazz club - same name.

    We went along and booked a front table with top wine and on came the band and - as I stage-whispered to Steph - "This is NOT the band I know and love."

    I don't know why they do this. The original sound is what it is.

    Listen to Nick's crystal-clear picking and spot-on timing.

    JOVIAL VACATION FOR JON VENABLES

    ~ Murder Timeline ~

    Bravo the reptile media for plonking the Bulger case back in the news and reviving the heat of the chase.

    Protection: £280,000 a year? FFS, shouldn't cost that much just to bring in a pro' tracker - in, do the job, out back home to Albania. Huge savings, could spend it on trough/sluice celebrations at having removed Cost Centre Venables and everyone getting back to harassing members of the public.

  • Dating mum of 5-year-old - if Mumsy didn't know it then, she's got to know it now, and other nosey-parkers in the playground. The brains can't be all between her legs and there's no one chattier than a sandpit of mothers. Ooh, can't you see their expressions and hear their knowing whispers:
    "And he seemed such a nice quiet young man. I said to Frieda here - didn't I Free? - aye, I said Viv's fallen on her feet at last, got herself a nice solid yoong man, make a right fine hoosband if she gives him what he wants and doosn't push it.

    Ooh, it were a right shock to find he was - you know, that bloke who did ... 'orrible that were ... ee, if I had known ... and that day he came to the park, remember? he had them sweets he were handing around ... my Britney came that close to accepting one, didn't you, loov? From where she's standing now to this ashtray - he didn't actually tooch you, did he loov? Nay, he didn't tooch her but it were this close. Eee, that's summat to tell yer grandchildren, ducks, no mistake."

  • A 'wrap' of cocaine - well I never. I never knew it was a 'wrap' of coke. All my reading and posing and running lines in posh lavs, and no one ever offered me a 'wrap'. Where've I been most of my life, too stoned to take in a cool word like 'wrap'? Obviously.
  • "Lack of monitoring"
  • Pussy Prance for Pusillanimous Parole Prats

    Bollocks to lack of monitoring: lack of internet sleuthing, more like. I bet they could have hammered 'n' nailed both of them to the Iron Maiden from Day 52.

    The press reptiles were handed the goods - plus how to skirt the wimpo law - and they flubbed it.

    'Freed on licence' ~ Freed on freebies

    57 images of child porn

    Surprise surprise ... Venal Balls fiddling around with child pornography.

    Venables appearing before the court to enter a plea and, to my usual fury and contempt, court proceedings will be "the subject of unprecedented reporting restrictions to protect his new identity."

    I bow to no man in my admiration for the power of the InterWeb to out and expose all villains - so WTF is wrong with everyone that we've been led such a merry dance for so long over the simplest of tasks of nailing Venners once and for all? I cross my fingers at each court appearance that some enterprising sleuth will beat the restrictions and have the ball back for the wings to run amok with.

  • Grisly and ongoing drama ~ collective neurosis * unmasked punishment * lack of compassion * death too good, "life meaning life", yadda yadda * constant fear of exposure and retribution.

    Yadda bladda.

    TELL US WOT HE DONE!!

    £6.25 million it's cost us.

  • Cloaking the ID of these Bulger bludgeoners
  • Financing their nancy-boy pampers by shrinks
  • Forking out for their fawking drugs habits and clubbing
  • I mean ... dude! Wazza deal?


    VENABLES BACK IN CLINQUE

    ~ Venables Thompson Bulger ~

    One of those "We interrupt this broadcast" situations:

    Oyez oyez ... department of Troof will Aht ... Jonno Venaballs

    Alleged to have had difficulty controlling his temper since his release ... involved in a punch-up ... came to the attention of the Filth twice before, 1) When he was caught snorting cocaine down an alleyway; 2) In a row outside a nightclub.

    Rumour hath that Jonno 'began taking cocaine and ecstasy while attending night clubs and music festivals.'

    Say WHUT?

  • Snorting cocaine ... IN A HANDBAG?

  • Nightclub?

  • Coke and ecstasy ~ night clubs and music festivals?

    FFS, I may look a damn'd fool but I'm not that thick.

    MY TAX DOLLARS FUNDING A THUG TO PONCE AROUND SNORTING COKE AND 'E'??

    I dread to think what the fragrant Denise will post about that on her Twitter page

    (2031 'followers', 'pon my soul.

    Who says appreciation of womanly beauty is dead?)

    On which topic, la belle Denise is taking exactly the right line - generous, pardoning, charitable. The only way when you're an icon, adored by the many and in whose name (and shining beauty) burly gentlemen with chequered military careers must be even as I type planning a 'robust' scolding of Master Venables and a decisive outing of Thomo' 'Hawk' Thompson.

    Way to go, guys. Rubber's meeting the road, metal/pedal interface, the eagle is swooping, [insert cliché of choice].

    BEHIND BARS FOR 'TANTRUMS' VENAL BALLS

    ~ Clamp down on ecstatic clubbing for Bulger basher ~

    Aye, that Venables about whom - with Master Thompson - I have posted in blogs passim.

    I take this as a very encouraging sign and I shall say no more except to re-unite this sturdy topic to my Google Alerts and sit back with a wolfish grin and large amounts of good liquor and 'baccy within every finger's reach.

    And if this means up-to-date photos of la belle Denise - who I'm sure has kept her fragrant looks - well, then, all the better.

    I've left the mugshot full size for easier recognition by any brightissima spark (it'll be a woman who nails him) but I assume the plastiques got to work on his pretty-boy features and he's the same indistinguishable plodding 27-yr-old as the rest of us.

    What Real Men Buy: OK, you nosey lot - here's the contents of just this morning's shopping - classy rag, classy muzak, stuff to make me smell sweet to my sweetie ... ribbons to print my lurve notes in couleur ... chocs to cuddle up over after ....

    My Torygraph comes up trumps:

    Quoth (somewhat repetitively) one Michael Wolkind QC:

  • "Significant chance the breach was serious ... Now it's been publicised, must be a possibility of his new identity being exposed in prison and the inference must be it was a serious breach

  • To go to all the trouble of building him a new identity and a new life, there must be a significant chance it was serious."
  • Standard licence conditions for life sentences include keeping in touch with your supervising officer, permanently residing at an approved address, and not to commit any offence.

  • The Ministry of Justice refused to say whether Venables had simply breached his licence or committed another offence.

  • Venables will appear before a hearing of the Parole Board within 28 days of being recalled; details of the breach will be examined and the Board decide whether he will ever be released."

    Anywaay, the main thing is he's back inside where a whole new breed and generation of crims (and screws!) will make his acquaintance and acquaintance him with what he's been missing all this time gadding about in freedom.

    Valiant Miroir ~ of course, the good old Mirror can't just report Venners being back in nick, it has to slant it as if it was the paper itself that got the varlet back behind bars.

    The Case History - Good to see inclusion of Judge Butler-Sloss's correct sloshing that, "their lives are genuinely at risk as well as their physical safety if their new identities and whereabouts became public knowledge".

    And by God have I spent every waking moment trying to see that B-S's fears weren't just BS.

    Dig delve connive bribe hobnob snoop ... someone had to know something or someone who knew someone who knew something. Feelers went out wherever I went:

  • Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Stanley, Foreign Correspondents Club)
  • USA (San Antonio, Boston, Bainbridge Island, Seattle)
  • London (Clapham and Kennington)
  • Corfu (Greece).

    Honestly, I have to admit to a deep disappointment and shame in the pathetic failure of my fellow Netizens and the Web in general to sleuth even a pinprick of light on where Thumper and Vennyballs have been holed up.

    Pathetic for us but well done the murderers. They must write their story while fingers and nails are still where God put them and tell us how they evaded the best that e-bloodhoundery sent after them.

    Let's hope that the witch hunt now underway following Venables' return to jug will make up for all the years of well-behaved observance of the rules.

    The government are on the run; the press have the scent and the people are behind them. Too many years have passed for anyone - inside or out - to give a fuck any more: we want blood on the sand and don't forget there's elections coming up.

    Bread and circuses, or you're out on your political ear.

    Speaking of circuses, who was the northern press baron -name's on tip o' tongue - who so splendidly encapsulated the essence of his readers' tastes:

    "Koont 'n' poozles. That's what t'reader wants.

    Koont n poozzles."

    Never forgot that. I was regaled with that anecdote my first lunchtime in a Fleet Street boozer and it lodged with me. Well, succinct eternal verities like that do, don't they?

    So where are we?

    23 June 2001: parole board decides to release Thompson and Venables.

    Conditions included a ban on them contacting the Bulger family or each other, or visiting Merseyside without the written consent of their probation officers ... blah di dah di day ... suckahs!

    Attaboy SkyNews : Never thought I'd be hi-fiving newsy night-soil but Sky are right on course in urging prison inmates,

    "Shouldn't be difficult to identify a 27-year-old with a hint of a Scouse accent and a chip on his shoulder.

    It could earn you more than your next armed robbery. And no risk of getting shot."

    A medal, more like.

    Venables' lawyer speaks - some cautious but mildly interesting speculations.

    I like the revelation that he always thought it would be Thompson they'd rope in first.

    Oh. My. God. Can't you picture the pair soaking their Y-fronts at the tsunami of revived press interest?

    And Thompson's fury at Venables' blowing it and completely fucking up all those years of careful camouflagery.

    That's Pretty-Boy 'Thumper' on the left, about whom press reports had it that:

    "In 2005 there were reports that Thompson was addicted to heroin and was being prescribed the substitute methadone to wean him off his habit.

    The following year [it] was revealed that he was gay and had been given permission by his probation service 'minders' to live with his homosexual lover, who was aware of his past."

    Oh poh poh, where do I sign up to invest in the movie?

    Applicants for the role of Denise, the queue starts at the casting couch on the left.

    More details! demands the usually placid Evening Standard. Once upon a time it would have been tumbrils trundling and the clack of knitting needles. Now it's the tumbling of Net-sleuth algorithms ... I love the bay of a lynch mob in the morning.

    The news desks have sniffed the wind and this one has legs.

    Mired in Confucian: No wonder. Look at the bubbling troubling storm in a hornet's nest that Fleet Street's so gleefully toiling on ~ public interest, 'callous and insensitive' (not to mention kick in the teeth), drink and drug problem (yah, if he lacked one then, he'll be heavily into that stuff now), GBH, new identity, fierce criticism from senior police officers, victims’ groups and justice campaigners.

    First time in prison ~ The Thunderer in splendid purple-prosed form:

    "Of all the things that Jon Venables will be feeling as he tastes life in his first prison, his overriding emotion will be fear ... real identities exposed ... hunted down to face “street” justice ... Gossip spreads like bush-fire in prisons, and a 27-year-old man who has broken the terms of his licence will have an “arrow flashing over his head”
    There's imagery for you, guys and gals.

    Righteous Wrath ~ I try to pose as a 'fair' selector of reportage but what I'm really after is damning with faint defence. I always like what Brian Masters writes so this piece can be my 'faux fairness' submission.

    Actually, there's some very good wordage here - as harrowing in their literary skill as the scenes he describes.

    Try this for ace wordsmithery:

    "We cannot feel anger at this man who was detained yesterday, for we no longer know who he is.

    He may be married. He may be a father. He may have a job. He may be kind and considerate. He may be rotten and deceitful. He may have shoplifted. He may have sold drugs. It does not matter, for we are not interested in him; we are interested in the little boy who terrified us with his malice all those years ago, and we do not want to let that shudder evaporate and lose its power.


    In some very unpleasant way, we cherish it still. We must never be suspected of any maturity that would allow us to spot the possibility of redemption. [My favourite bit, that]

    That, at least, is the feeling some newspapers appear to foster; I can think of a couple which, if their editors knew where this man was, would pursue him to the death if necessary.

    ['Pursuit to the Death' - aye, there's your movie title - but there's more]

    ... I attended the trial of Thompson and Venables throughout, and heard all the evidence. Yet I did not feel the presence of wickedness. I felt the unfathomable mystery of human behaviour, the awe of ignorance, the chilling impossibility of knowing what this was really all about.

    The trial, which ought to have been a lesson in philosophy, was instead a performance, a parade of adult indignation hurled at two frightened little boys who knew they had done something terrible, and did not know why.

    They could barely see over the bar of the dock in which they sat; it came up to their chins. And so I also felt some shame at being witness to this show."

    Emotive stuff and that's only the namby-pamby chunks that caught my evil eye.

    Attacked work 'colleague': Pair 'grappled' before others intervened and pulled them apart ... alleged 'victim' said to have made official complaint about the attack.

    If I know anything about fisticuffs among 'work colleagues' - and I do, across 3 continongs - Hell (and the Official Complaints book) hath no fury.

    That grappling 'colleague' will be the toast of the Snug Bar.

    You joking?

  • Arm wrestle the bicep that wielded the brick that smashed Jimmy Bulger's head in?
  • Shake t'hand that laid JB on the rail track?
  • Lock limbs with the legs that walked Bolger Jr to the rail track and then away as he lay there to be tracked racked and quartered by the oncoming train?

    Fuck, dude - set this man up with a drink or 5. Stuff Madame Tussauds

    Whoops, so busy fancying mother Denise I'd sort of overlooked there might be a dad in the woodpile.

    According to pater Ralph, the lack of information has been a disgrace.

    ‘Our legal system danced on the grave of my innocent son without a hint of shame or compassion ... Now their actions have come back to haunt them.’

    Careful, sir ~ don't want to get so carried away that we spoil our own chances.

    Dancing on graves, actions back to haunt - that's crazy talk. Be like Denise - waft and look sad and say nowt. That way the Hang 'em High crowd can do their thang and you can maintain a pious Jerry Springer 'Who, me?' pose.

  • Lost his Rights

  • Wall of Silence

  • Witchhunt ~ Fevered speculation, shrill headlines and whipping up public fear

  • Cover Blown

  • Good Hickory

    Drug-fuelled Nights? ~ Denise Fergus to meet Jack Straw ... nice little foto op ... blather blather ... but what I liked was the reference to Venal Balls returning for 'drug-fuelled nights'. If they're not drug-fuelled, they don't make the grade with the 4th Estate.

    'Complex Factors' - A former Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald, tells Beeb Today presenter Evan Davis that "complex factors are at play."

    'Extremely serious claim' - the scent hottens.

    FURIOUS BRITONS ~ I do love The Sun.

    Talk about busy and unruly.

    Aye, if you want to take the temperature of bully-boy righteous Britannia, this is where to insert the thermometer.

    What's that line about the British public in one of its periodic fits of morality?"

    Well, there's nowt periodic about the poop this redtop peddles - it's constant and incarnadine.

    Hence its perfect role as attack-dog conscience of the rest of us in hounding VenalBalls.

    Can't you just see the slavering News Editor crafting this update we've been waiting for.

    "Not the 'police', we're playing hardball now. They're 'cops' - and speaking of which, that's the last 'drink' I'm pouring down that c*** of a filing clerk until she starts coming up with the lowdown. I'll give her 'secrecy' FFS - that's for the c***ing Little People".

    Sun reveals shock issue world exclusive:

    "New details emerged about Venables' return to jail — and the incredible secrecy surrounding it.

    He was taken to the unnamed prison by two plain-clothes cops in an unmarked car with tinted windows.

    Only the most senior staff knew of his arrival.

    The car was driven into a secure reception area and staff were banned from even looking in his direction.

    Unusually, they were not told the identity of the cops who delivered him, and were instructed to make no official note of the car.

    Neither Venables' fingerprints nor photo appear on jail records - just his new name."

    Ooh, I bet the knives are out over that. No more fat retainers for well-placed grass roots informers. Wot? All them brown envelopes slipped under the table and still Sun reptiles are kept in the dark. This bodes no boot, as Lennon had it 'in his own write'.

    Sickening Sex Crime that will horrify the nation. Sun has 'exact details' (but they're not allowed to say, so expect every outu, roundu, overu, and innu-endo they can get away with until - whoops! - the horrifying truth slips out.

    No report complete - wivaht a pronouncement from Kato Anorakiana - Straw forced to meet the pouting Denise. Forced? Blimey, I'd be selling tickets.

    CHILD PORN ~ As if the poor bugger wasn't already sufficiently buggered, now they're saying he's back in the In à cause de porn, which means he's really buggered.

    If I were him, I'd apply my creative attention to topping meself and escaping this mortal cul de sac, and I do mean cul as in cutta.

    Mistaken ID: the only problem with handing a lynch mob a loaded internet is that they will *very* soon want results, and if the real bloke doesnt have the decency to be hunted down, a substitute has to do. No one does this periodic fit bit better than today's Brit.

    Man of Straw ~ cordial quitter in venal balls quiz

    Prosecution slammed ~ By t'heck that was a good tip to buy shares in the movie. This is going somewhere and Central Casting will be working overtime.

    Vera Farmiga for ProseCUTE-ress Maggie Atkinson - yes yes yess!

    Sack Maggie! ~ enter the delectable Denise. Cat fight!

    [Note to broker: Pick up another 20 thou' shares before they cast Megan Fox as Ms Atkinson's secretary.

    MF: "Mizz Acheson? Jock Straw on Line One."

    MA: "Tell him I'm busy!"

    "Aww ~ and he sounded so nice ... like that cute British accent totally rocks"]

    The Venables Rub

    20 x 24/7 ~ Ugh, I fear for venal balls. As I've said somewhere else and definitely not passim, I have had the briefest of whispered brushes with the hem of Her Majesty's hospitality and it was clear from clang one that if the inmates want to get at someone, at they will get.

    The screws may look flat faced and guardianly but all they're concerned with is not being carpeted with dereliction of duty. It's like a good accountant finding a way to evade a pesky tax.

    [Incidentally, my father always held that it is a duty to evade tax and a crime to avoid it. I notice that some pillars of the press no longer spot the distinction.]

    As I was saying, the screws apply themselves to finding the loophole by which they cannot be faulted but the unfortunate target still gets done. The guards above all know on which side their wotsits get whetted.

    Cocky Venables lording it - someone at this newspaper is determined to stir it.

    British Witch hunt at its Foulest ~ this is the sort of rabid writing for which I so closely monitor Project Venal Balls. Splendid stuff and it even has one of those creepy pseudo friendly Childrens Hour names - Uncle Monty.

    As long as the Montys are out there churning out this sort of rabble-rousery, the Venal Ballsups of society can stay very afraid.

    Muthas of Invention - Private Eye good as ever on nailing the reptiles.

    Huntley slashed ~ These things are catching.

    The next chiv almost certainly has Venal Balls' nomen on it.

    But plenty of time 'til the next Full Moon Melt-down: March 30, Pesach, first day of Passover, which is a bit of a laugh.

    Do you hear the rolling thunder, Jon?

    Ian Jon, Jon Ian.

    Zut alors, almost twinned - rearrange the following into a notorious child killer.

    Crazy enough for you?

    The Tabloid Beasting of Venables ~ Goodness, the fine titles coming out of this BulgerBalls Brouhaha - and who'd've guessed that Anorak would lead the field?

    Crazy Media Beasts ‘Evil’ Jon Venables - that is a verbatim line from the Anorakiana stable. Ayup, there's imagery for you, guys and gals.

    Poisonous relationship ~ between tabloid eds and pols.

  • Absolutely spot-on link to FirstPost in which "documentary maker Richard Symons exposes a poisonous relationship between tabloid editors and politicians."

    Anorakiana shock issue exclusive: The Who Why When and What of Venal Balls ... plus all the scores and puzzles.

    Hilarious spotlight on the scribblers.

    "Crackers Atkinson, coward Straw and the rest of the motley crew." Nothing actually new, of course, in this VenalBalls hue and cry nonsense, I just liked the ring of all that motley crackers cowards rant.

    Jump. Start. - very odd. Look at this ... Ed Balls, is it? Rather nice looking bloke. Anyway, he's being asked about Crackers Atkinson and waiting for the question and as soon as he hears the name he gives a little start. Rum.

    Got a thing for killers - well, here's a rum one, no mistake about it. Rather too close to April 1 for my liking but my job not to question, just to post.

    "A small chance that he could do terrible things to me ..." Ack! Get away with you, you silly slag.

  • 22 November 2010

    Five Ways to Kill a Man

    Jimmy 'Blues Bruiser' Potts likes poetry. I like poetry. One of the favourites I promoted was the gentle Edwin Brock.

    "There are many cumbersome ways to kill a man.
    You can make him carry a plank of wood
    to the top of a hill and nail him to it.
    To do this properly you require a crowd of people
    wearing sandals, a cock that crows, a cloak
    to dissect, a sponge, some vinegar and one
    man to hammer the nails home.

    Or you can take a length of steel,
    shaped and chased in a traditional way,
    and attempt to pierce the metal cage he wears.
    But for this you need white horses,
    English trees, men with bows and arrows,
    at least two flags, a prince, and a
    castle to hold your banquet in.

    Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind
    allows, blow gas at him. But then you need
    a mile of mud sliced through with ditches,
    not to mention black boots, bomb craters,
    more mud, a plague of rats, a dozen songs
    and some round hats made of steel.

    In an age of aeroplanes, you may fly
    miles above your victim and dispose of him by
    pressing one small switch. All you then
    require is an ocean to separate you, two
    systems of government, a nation's scientists,
    several factories, a psychopath and
    land that no-one needs for several years.

    These are, as I began, cumbersome ways to kill a man.
    Simpler, direct, and much more neat is to see
    that he is living somewhere in the middle
    of the twentieth century, and leave him there."

    SHOOTIST BLUES

    Went down to Corfu Central
    Find me a shiny gun
    You know that square on Theotoki
    Decided to buy me a gun
    All the garden crap and yappety blah yap
    Fucking four years, seven months 'n' 14 days to git me one

    [Fie on your procrastinating ways!]

    Looked inside the Hobby Shop
    All I wanted was a gun
    That's my kind of 'Hobby' shop
    Peddling my kind of gun:
    Razor too messy, gassing too groggy
    Jumping splats the sidework when you've got down

    [Look bad on the gravestone, know what I mean?]

    Got talking to the gunshop gal
    What she had in her barrel of fun'
    Chatted up that gunshop gal
    What she had, Blam-And-It's-Done
    She took me to the backroom
    Holster-wear guaranteed to stop or stun

    [I didn't need no holster but the bazookas she was packing, I played right along.]

    She asked what kind of ammo
    Rifled, ribbed, or smooth as a baby's bum?
    She showed me her tray of ammo
    Told her I didn't need but one
    A gob-stopping muzzle nuzzler,
    Get my Personal Business done.

    21 November 2010

    BB

    COWPERTHWAITE

    Bravo and well done James Delingpole for his 'Television' review Rallying cry in the 13 Nov Spectator and his salute to Sir John Cowperthwaite:

    "Yet, as Durkin showed, this has not been the Hong Kong Chinese example. There, thanks to the groundwork of perhaps the 20th century’s most able and farsighted administrator — a British civil servant called John Cowperthwaite — Hong Kong has been run since the 1960s on impeccably classical liberal lines. The top rate of tax is 15 per cent; the poor don’t pay any. The economic growth it has experienced as a result has been spectacular, but not to the detriment of the poor (who remain perfectly well looked after) nor to public services such as the transport system (shinier, cleaner, vastly superior to our Moscow c.1950-style Underground because — true Arthur Laffer principles — low-tax regimes bring in more to the Exchequer than high-tax regimes."

    John's son Hamish and I grew up together in Hong Kong and he remained my most faithful friend. Our fathers were also close and power houses in the government.

    It's good to see him still recognised.

    RIPPIN' PLANTS

    Look at the ignoramus comment about my mother needing to 'rip' plants from the ground simply to draw their roots.

    And the berk actually has the nerve to tell my mother how to garden ...

    Some muthas do 'ave 'em.

    20 November 2010

    THE AUTUMN WIND

    Emperor Wu-ti

    Autumn wind rises: white clouds fly.
    Grass and trees wither: geese go south.
    Orchids all in bloom: chrysanthemums smell sweet.
    I think of my lovely lady: I never can forget.
    Floating-pagoda boat crosses Fen River.
    Across the mid-stream white waves rise;
    Flute and drum keep time to sound of rowers' song;
    Amidst revel and feasting, sad thoughts come;
    Youth's years how few! Age how sure!

    19 November 2010

    BIG ISSUE

    Sitting round a jug of Nemea, someone asks how's my girls?

    Owt good news of retrieval of their dad's heirloom jewelry from Villa Thefti?

    Filchèd from my bedside locker April 6 2007, taken to my brother's Tuscan retreat for safer keeping from thieving Corfiots.

    I say no news either way. Someone who knows the background repeats the general puzzlement over why my nephews/nieces should have first dibs on my most precious possessions when they're solidly locked into my Will of Jan 9 2003 as destined for the fruits of my own loins?

    Supportive Pedant (thin-lipped scowl): "There is no issue"

    [Like kid bro' has no kids]

    Newcomer to the squabble: "Whadya mean, No Issue? It's a fucking big issue."

  • Tilt of flagon
  • Kerchunk of goblet toasts
  • Incantation curses: Penury, plague, perdition.
  • WhatsDown-Corfucius

    My attention has been drawn to an honourable mention in despatches in none other than the excellent WaazzUp-Corfu - to which all good citizens should be subscribed as their moral compass and essential Island Lifestyle reading.

    Loipon, until my blushes subside, this blog is going to ground ... at least until the furore abates and the hordes of under-age HTML groupies cease their infernal baying for scraps of undergarmentry and pouting and bosomy thrustings against my manly quill and throbbing keyboard.

    SPLISH SPLASH

    To be intoned in yer best Noel Coward:

    "Very rrainy, Gouviá"

    Speaking of Noel, my fave spoof.

    Still with spoofs, must-see camp movie of the season.

    Don't miss the unctuous vagina/hand line - and how often can you punch that one into a blog?

    Things are looking up already.

    Megali puddles everywhere and, this being Greece, pedestrians are having to step lively to avoid a drenching as the motorists zoom by.

    Gestures and oaths!

    Moi having just passed my test and still driving with utmost courtesy and forethought, I slow right down and look very smug if someone else is coming in the opposite direction to splatter the peds.

    I make good Grik gesture of

    "We are not all like that oaf. Observe how I slowed and now crawl past you with nary a ripple."
    An easy hand signal once you've mastered the basic Grik finger twiddle and gets return gestures of gratitude and friendship.

    A PETITION TOO FAR

    I feel like a Bobster song - OK, I'm always in the mood for one or other of the maestro's magic.

    What I mean is that I feel as if I'm in a song about how many petitions must one man field ... before it's time to pour the first absinthe of the day?

    This wretched easyjet petition just keeps thumping on my doormat - many from people whom Cook would not allow into Facebook front parlour.

    And wasn't there someone who replied to the effect that we already have what we're after and so this is all a waste of duplicated time.

    I'm going to spend this morning writing a tool that will count duplicate petitions and send a polite message back after the 5th or 6th plea ...

    WORLD RECORDS DAY

    15 November 2010

    CAINE TO A 'T'

    Both Coogan and the other bloke are brilliant.

    Caine was becoming an old fart anyway and his pathetic loser Harry Brown was ... pathetic and losing. Who does he think he is, to carry on the old roles - Terry Stamp?

    First get a 'Priscilla' under yer belt, mate, then think about reliving past muscle. Anyway, that diamond movie with Demi Moore was a total fronking fantasy failure ... you think the CCTV wouldn't've caught him moving up the corridor just because the ficko guard was scoffing a donut?

    Forget it - this sketch makes up for it all.

    THE FACES WE DESERVE

    " ... the role of being a carer is the most stressful role of all ..."

  • Detox your thoughts
  • "IAmSpartacus"

    13 November 2010

    AUNG

    Of how many can one post just a single name? Ok, this is like what did the Romans ever do for us:

  • Elton
  • Santana
  • John, Paul, George ... [by then the screams are too loud to hear the 4th bloke's name]
  • Angelina
  • ... you get my drift.

    Anyway, good news on the Burma front and I was just wondering the other night as Obama spoke, when did we stop calling it Myanmar? I thought diplomacy obleejed no matter how stinky we personally found the regime?

    Don't get me wrong - I like it.

    One in the eye for her vile captors.

    And whatever happened to that preposterous American buffoon who swam across the lake pretending to be on a mission to save her but in fact prolonged her detention?

    Do tell me he suffered every type of beatings and abuse when he got home ....