All but an ark lark

Day four on the Big Brother Ark. Noah is washing his hair. Shem, Ham and Japeth are feeding the animals. The Unicorns have decided to go for a swim...

Will it ever stop bloody raining? Ok, I know that this week combines Glastonbury with Wimbledon, but there is no cricket so it doesn't have to be torrential. What do you bet there is a hosepipe ban?

And the bloody Intertoto cup has started. Isn't there supposed to be a bit of the year with no real football?

Hits of Glastonbury: Arctic Monkeys, Go! Team, the Coral, Kaiser Chiefs.

But the Who were rubbish.

Let it rain, let it rain, let it rain.

Summer's gone

Well that didn't last long. No more heatwave. Now we are building Arks. And there is a Sheffield flood.
Luckily the holiday was last week, and went fine. Though I am having acid flashbacks about 7 foot tall Woodpeckers. And then I see the photos and discover they were real.

So, in dedicated work avoidance am busy buying old CDs on E-bay. Downloading is not killing the music business, but e-bay must be doing some damage. Why buy a new Tracey Thorn CD when you can buy some music hacks unwanted review copy (in a really nice limited edition sleeve) for £4. Including postage. Delivered to my door. Sure beats going to HMV.

Summer's here

How do I know? Reggae sounds good again.

And no I don't want to talk about the European cup final.

And so it begins

Well, couple of hours to the Champions League final. Time for optimism. Time for realism comes later. It will be great if we can do it, but the odds are against us.
Last time I was in my local pub - this time in a bar in a far away country. Time moves on.
I never actually thought we would ever again reach the final, let alone win it - let alone reach a second final in three years. A pretty good achievement in itself. Come on you Reds.

THE GO BETWEENS - Right Here

Oh, God. Watching this again, can somebody please tell me why the Go-Betweens weren't big as U2, or at least Grant a major solo star?

A year since Grant died, and still the rockstar I miss the most. Purely because now there will be no more songs.

Alone again, Or..

Alone again naturally
All by myself
Just like starting over
It takes too
Helterskelter
It's all over now
Who's sorry now?
With or without you
Pick yourself up, and start right over again.

So, back in business for myself. On me tod. By me sen.
Hey, ho, let's go.

A stitch in time

The wounds don't heal until you take the stitches out...
Mole has gone, but the wound remains.

You can revisit the past - but it sits nervously on the edge of the sofa, and never relaxes.
Why should it?

When does being cryptic become enigmatic? Or profound, even?
Oh, never mind.

Groundhog day

So, AC Milan vs. Liverpool FC, the rematch.
Looks like narrativium rules.

Gordon Bennet it was a tense evening against Chelsea. I didn't enjoy a minute of it until it was over. Seconds of it were quite good, but nothing lasting for 60 seconds or more.

I remember a Jasper Carrott sketch that started with him saying "I got a mole". Well I don't. Do have a lot of stitches and a big scar though.

tonight's the night

Chelsea vs. Liverpool - the rematch.
As they say in Star Wars, I have a bad feeling about this...

Thou shalt always kill

Warren Ellis thinks he was slow to this. I got it from his website. What does that make me?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-MYVv4tgQc

No, seriously. Dan le Sac vs. Scoobius Pip. I would say it was the bomb, but I think that is one of the thou shalt nots.

what were they thinking?

A wonderwomen strip taken from the blog of the above name.

Can tentacle sex be far behind?

I have a bad feeling about this...

So, the Mighty Reds are through to the Semis of the European Cup, where we will play.... (cue drumroll) ... Chelsea. Groundhog day. And this time it is personal.
What worries me more than the fact that they owe us one, and are actually a better team than us, is that if we lose it could set up another Man U vs Chelsea match. Possibly the third in 2 weeks which will deterimine who wins the Premiership, FA Cup and European Cup. Groundhog Day.
The universe's driving force ((C) T. Pratchett) is narrativium - which means a good story overrules everything else. It would be such a good story that I really don't think we have a chance of getting past Chelsea if Man Utd beat AC Milan.
Our only chance is for Milan to be the red scum, and then narrativium dictates that we will beat Chelsea and set up a repeat of Istanbul. But in Athens...
Groundhog day. You know it is true. You may not believe it, but you know it is true.

"It's deja vu all over again" - Yogi Berra

What a long strange journey it is...

25 years of Love and Rockets. We are both getting old. I remember reading these as they came out (and I could afford them) in a housing association flat with the first of the white cats. And I am re-reading Locas from the beginning.

Now, back to work...

The kids are alright

Indeed they are. I finally met with a selection of the often mentioned (and maligned) youth of today, and you know what? They are fine. Probably less spotty and more together than I was at their age.
Every generation thinks that their parents (and grandparents) were gods, and that they are the last civilised generation. Every generation is wrong. There were no golden ages. There will be no monsters raised entirely by Playstation 3.

You think we would learn...

For the dead

Music by Gene.
One of those times. Couple of people I heard about but didn't know have died young (ish). It happens every day, and one day most of the world will never know when it happens to you, me and everyone we know. Unless it is really out of the ordinary.

Love your family, love your friends, love everyone.
It is a short day in the sun.

to serve them all our days

Apparently, Russian fishermen have found a strange alien creature making squeeking noises ... and eaten it. Let's hope it does not have friends who come a looking. Unless of course they say, "It's ok - Fred did look sort of delicious", and don't follow it up with "and so do your children. Can I borrow some ketchup?".

http://english.pravda.ru/science/mysteries/07-02-2007/87167-alien_monster-0

In other news, Pravda is still going? In other, other news, there is a Russian Fark?

Picture is a New York grafitti artist. Nice isn't it?
Title is from Microdisney

Context is everything

Two matches, sucessive 0-1 defeats after outplaying our opponents. Two different reactions. Losing to the Scum was gutting, losing to Barca but still putting out the best team in the world completely different. The Scum should win the Premiership - they have the luck. We could easily have won three or four nil.
But now I am dreading the draw for the Champions League - I really want a foreign club, but it could be that 4 of the 7 are British (more realistically, forget Celtic).

Curiously Mrs Breadwinner is Barca for a few days trying to earn a shekel or two. Leaving me with the breadcrumbs and more work than I can manage. So, I'm not managing and mainly letting it wash over the top of me. Life is not helped by a kind of collective nervous breakdown by the family technology. Amongst the victims are the Purple People Carrier, the washing machine and at least one of the DVD players.

Don't get me started on the fucking Virgin/Sky debacle. Tonight I missed Battlestar Galactica for the first week. The fuckers are going to pay for that.

The short, sharp cut is healing nicely. Stitches out tomorrow.

out, out damn spot

So, a small vertical incision, and a biopsy. Do you think it will make me look hard? Maybe be some protection for when the Mighty Reds play the Scum tomorrow lunchtime. Or maybe a provocation. Who knows.

Meanwhile Virgin Media are denying me my Battlestar Galactica. To say the least I am pissed (in the American sense of the phrase). Where do they think they get off? "it was too expensive, so we decided to drop it and not pass the savings along to you..." Jeez. What a shower.

To quote the most excellent Ms Winehouse, what kind of Fuckery is this?

I feel like getting all Executioner one Richard Branson's ass. This is probably my favourite page in comics. Certainly top 5 along with Cerebus and the countess, The Death of Speedy and death of the Invisible Man in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and you are in here with me from Watchmen. In case you need a clue it is from Walt Simonson's Thor.

NSFW - but funnier than real comics

I recommend http://mightygodking.livejournal.com/

A guy reworking the dialogue of Marvel Civil War for comic effect. And it is funny. Even though I have never read the original. If you look it up, see if you too think that the artist has got a real thing going for Dagger (or is it Cloak) - the white jumpsuit looks like it has been drawn by photoreferencing a whole bunch of porn. Or is it just me?

(Scans daily motto: It's never just you...)

Words of Wisdom - from Douglas Adams

"Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so."-- Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

Ain't that the truth?