July 22nd - July 28th 2002
Sunday Out/Not Out
Saturday An end
Friday Mosca cojonero
Thursday Brown-nosing
Wednesday Swept
Tuesday Cantuar Idol
Monday Let Meg do it
Sunday 28th July 2002
Out: All nine American miners(hurrah)
Out: Rob Lowe leaves West Wing (sob)
Not out: Jeffrey Archer loses his appeal (hiss)
Not out: Big Brother Alex refuses to discuss his sexuality (boo)
Saturday 27th July 2002
An end, at last, to pondering whether Jonny's appearance on Big Brother has been sponsored by the Association of Serial Rapists
An end, at last, to marvelling at Kate's apparently endless capacity for alcohol
An end, at last, to wondering in which faculty Jade most resembles a hyper-inflated sex-toy, charm or intelligence
And an end, at last, to wondering whether Alex is ever going to get his cock out. (He's half-German, you know, and apparently he says he ticked the box marked 'bisexual' on his application form by mistake but, really, you have to wonder, don't you, but, then again, I'm not sure I could shag someone that's half-German or, indeed, someone that almost certainly got on the show under false pretences, or not, who knows?)
Who shall we talk about now?
Friday 26th July 2002
I can't say the fate of Gibraltar overly exercises me; the Gibraltarians I've met have been the worst kind of ex-pats: pompous Tory relics who never quite adopted to the sun setting on the empire.
But it must be said that the whole affair has been a treat for tired sub-editors, what with all those Rock metaphors to play with: "Rock-steady on Gibraltar", "Gibraltar's rock opera", "Between a rock and a hard place"
Appropriate, then, that Gibraltar's chief minister Peter Caruana seems to have his own perverse love affair with language going on. An agreement with Spain would be a "sword of Damocles" hanging over the colony. The "so-called red lines" are "getting pinker". A Government refusal to acknowledge his proposed referendum would be a "complete and ridiculous red herring" (as opposed to..?)
Spanish officials who have to deal with Caruana find him extremely irritating, and have their own way of describing him.
The Spanish phrase for the day is mosca cojonero. It means a fly around the balls.
Thursday 25th July 2002
Despite
Chasing down a link for a story about Tina Brown's £1 million payoff from Talk magazine last night, I found a mildly amusing article at Lost Brain which concerns itself with the media's ongoing determination to diss Ms Brown at every possible opportunity: Tina Brown-nosing.
Lost Brain admit they have no idea what Tina Brown looks like but, forewarned of the tendency to be malicious towards the poor woman, I opted not to link to my favourite image. Imagine, then, my surprise when I opened today's Independent to find they had no such compunction:
Wednesday 24th July 2002
Three gruelling dental appointments in seven days, but I have to admit it's worth it as I run my tongue around the newly estranged interior architecture of my mouth: freshly delineated lower front teeth that, liberated from all that calcification, don't look quite as chipmunky as I had feared, two gold crowns - bling!, and bling! again - plus a gigantic bridge-piece at lower left that must be at least an inch long and feels larger than Mount Rushmore.
What with that, and an overdue new haircut, I feel revitalised: I guess it was worth all those injections that left me wandering back down Whitechapel Road with a mouth that felt like a baboon's arse. (Not that I have ever felt a baboon's arse.)
The refurbishment continues: preparing to remove my sadly-cracked front cap, the dentist murmurs "Now can I get this off in one go?", a hypothetical question that receives a swift and all too concrete response as the cap explodes and flies across the room in several pieces.
I imagine it's not often that they have to sweep the floor of the dental surgery after you leave...
Tuesday 23rd July 2002
Not yet
The earthly powers-that-be announce their choice for Archbishop of Canterbury today; watch for puffs of white smoke over Downing Street. (Rowan Williams, the relatively gay-friendly choice, was leading the field by a mitre the last time I looked.)
But I think they missed a trick: next time round, watch for Cantuar Idol - six weekly tv shows in which we follow the candidates being groomed to give their best in a singin' dancin' stand-up routine ("Don't need no genetic modification;we're the team who gave you - transubstantiation. Smells, bells, separate hells, and we all go to heaven in a little rowboat. Clap clap.")
The frocks would be fabulous. And I'm sure they could find a suitably elevated host. (Not to mention The Ultimate Judge.)
Since
When and if the Arts Council finally get their finger out, and my new revenue stream comes online, a digital camera is very high up my list of things to spend money on (somewhere between food and paying my tax bill).
Until then, you'll have to take my word for this sign of the times, spotted stuck on the plate glass window of a bistro-barn at Canary Wharf:
Due to software problems, we are unable to offer table service at the moment. Please place your order at the bar.
What won't be on the list is a personal organiser: I take the view that life is quite complex enough without trying to organise it .
Which explains why I don't have a diary as such, just a scrawled list of dates with the shifts I'm due to work hastily entered beside them, plus the occasional cryptic reminder.
Which explains why I'm looking at Sunday week, August 5th and wondering what the hell "I-meet" means.
Anybody?
Monday 22nd July 2002
Yet
Stop press: Emperor reconsiders position on new clothes contest.
And a thought, for all of you who blog from work: dare you risk your employer's attention being forcibly brought to bear on the amount of time you spend maintaining your blog? (Laughs like a maniac as field of potential entrants suddenly implodes.)
But seriously - as we sat in the pub last night, David came up with my favourite strategy to date vis a vis the Great British Blog competition: let's all encourage Meg to enter (as she should) and then relax in the knowledge that she will win (as she should).
No contest.
Difficult decision, I know, but take as long as you like to think about it: truly, who would you rather share a plane with - terrorists or a group of performance artists?
......previous entries