Mousemats, Traffic and Politics

While in work today I noticed the shiny new mousemats that the centre have forked out for. Their shinyness is worth commenting upon, for they are noticably shiny. However, each individual computer in the cybercafe is attached to an LED mouse, so having a mousemat, especially one that is shiny and dimpled, makes using the computer harder. These are the petty niggles which rule my days.


I also discovered writ large upon the back of the mousemats that they are 'indestructible under normal use'. That is a quality I really look for in my mousemats. Indestructibility. This mousemat is surely the Superman of the mousemat race.


There is a stretch of road between my house and work, which is handy otherwise I would live in my workplace. HAHAHAHAHA.


There is a stretch of road between my house and work which is being given a new layer of cement or whatever it is the government have to feed the road to sate the fury of the road. It resents being driven on.


This re-tarmacking is a nuisance as it causes a huge traffic jam due to the inevitable bottle-necking. I appreciate that this is unavoidable and that the cement people (people who cement, not people made out of cement) are doing us proud and keeping us safe by spreading more molten rock on the road, but I was slightly put out by it so I feel I have the right to lash out mindlessly on the internet. And I do.


In the traffic jam I nobly allowed a gargantuan cement truck to merge from a junction and go in front of me in the queue which was snailing its way forward. This was fine, I didn't feel threatened or encroached upon by the colossal truck, the tailgate of which was, at some points, almost hovering over my head. This all changed, however, when an ambulance and a police car tried to force their way through the gridlocked throng.


Again, I appreciate that the amblumance people (purposeful mispelling) and the po-po were on their way to assist in an important matter, such as to apprehend a thief who had stolen a vulnerable person's heartbeat and to re-instate said heartbeat into the vulnerable person. I momentarily forgot what the other emergency service was. Fire engines.


So I was slightly intimidated and befuddled by being jammed behind a cement truck with an angry looking amblumance man glowering at me. I would like to say to that amblumance worker; "I am not Inspector Gadget. My car cannot perform physics-defying transformations. Suck it".


It is good to see that the country is still basically functioning even though all the leaders have taken time off to go and win a popularity contest.


I am particularly galled by the Conservative 'policy' which will run a project called 'School Stars' which is essentially X-Factor in schools. I would stick my neck out and say this is a bad idea. We already have X-Factor, it is called X-Factor and it is on the television and it is cackworthy shite. Surely running that sort of project can't be a political policy? That's not going to solve anything.


How do we solve the problems? GARY BARLOW WITH KIDS!! Excuse me? GARY BARLOW WITH TEH KIDDEZ!!


It's an odd one though, I don't oppose the putting of kids on stage in a competitive form. I have fond (if occasionally bitter) memories of the various Eisteddfodau that I partook of as a child. But I think the main difference between these and 'School Stars' (apart from the obvious cynical political manipulation that is inherent in it) is that the Eisteddfod's scope is huge, with events including oration, singing, musical recital, dancing, with the main focus being on writing. I think the focus on writing is an admirable thing, I feel that writing is implicitly more creative than singing. But I suppose I would say that, I love writing. In fact, I am writing right now. While I acknowledge that singing well is a talent and not an easy thing, I feel the individuality and creativity needed for things such as writing, composing etc makes efforts in those fields more valuable, and I feel it is something of a pity that singers can make a fortune simply rehashing other people's creations. MAKE SOMETHING NEW.


The consensus seems to be that Nick Clegg won the recent debate, which of course means that he did. I don't know who I'll vote for at this point as I haven't yet taken the time to research any party's manifesto, but I feel that if the Lib Dem's can build on this burst of popularity that would be a positive thing. From an incredibly selfish point of view I would welcome them coming to power if they stay true to their pledge of scrapping tuition fees. I think if that happened I'd go back to University. Which is reason for everyone to vote Lib Dem.


These are the policies they should be leading with! Nick Clegg says he'll put Gilder back in Uni!


I suppose what we'll find out in the next couple of weeks is whether voters would prefer to see kiddies played off against each other a la X-Factor, or if they'd rather see them in University.


I'd usually be pessimistic about it, but we must bear in mind that we did get Rage Against the Machine to number one.


As a short P.S. The sight of George Osborne still makes me retch. That is all.

Credit Cunts

It has been about a week since I was attacked.  I’ve left it this long, probably out of a desire to let it settle, and not to write something fatuous while the event was still foremost in my head.

  

I was walking home from a gig with my friend, around midnight, and we were planning on getting something to eat on the way home.  We were enjoying what had been one of the better nights out we have had in an area which is renowned for being crap.

  

Whilst waiting outside the shop, we were accosted by a pair of apes, though it is likely that they are unfamiliar with the term ‘accost’.  We were treated to such gripping dialogue as:

  

“Which one of you is driving then?” and “Where are the house parties?”

  

Now given that both me and my friend were on foot, and it was midnight on a Thursday, both of these questions contain assumptions that were incorrect, which would’ve been an impressive persuasive linguistic technique, if the person who uttered it didn’t look as though he was about to drop to all fours and howl at us.  It is perhaps unfair to suggest that this particular individual and his goon had been left out of several evolutionary steps through the generations, but they had nevertheless further retarded this process with as much alcohol as they could find.

  

I would very much like to suggest that alongside an age requirement for alcohol consumption there should also be a mandatory intelligence set where people who are of questionable intellect should be banned from consumption.

  

I would like to point out at this time that these individuals were not disadvantaged in any way, they were good old fashioned thick as shit.  Though in recent times it is in vogue to bemoan those who are a danger to themselves, I must stress that these thoughtless twats are a danger to other people, which is significantly worse.

  

Now, I would describe myself as a person who is quite outspoken and I also have quite strong views on a number of contentious topics.  It is masochistically amusing therefore to be physically assaulted, not because of my beliefs, but for a bag of chips.  It is doubly crazy that I was also carrying my friend’s guitar at the time, and yet in these financially difficult times it is the basic sustenance option which these oiks opted for.

  

The injuries that I sustained from this were purely physical and luckily not hugely serious, though I can’t hold out much hope that the two bastards who attacked us will get caught, even though the police have been incredibly helpful, though the process was an incredibly tedious one.

  

Though you do get to see some quite shameless and gutsy individuals when you are made to wait two hours in the reception of a police station.  One notable fellow admitted to breaking and entering, and then proceeded to report that he had been assaulted.  Now I don’t claim to have Holmesian knowledge of crime but surely that is still him in the wrong?  There were also no physical signs of an assault, which was particularly aggravating as I sat about a foot away from him looking for all the world like I had the face of Quasimodo.  Brazen, barefaced behaviour, what a dubious prick.  On my way out of the police station later on there was also a woman who seemed to be reporting the same story from the other angle, I had slightly more compassion for her, it may be slightly cold to hope that she hit him with something hard, but I think I would do something similar if a slimy shit snuck into my house.

  

There’s very little chance the two men who attacked us will get caught, we didn’t know them and were only able to give a superficial description of them, and to be fair they do have the most effective urban camouflage, that is, the fact that they are a pair of cunts in a town of cunts.  It’d be like looking for shit in a toilet bowl, you are guaranteed to find some, but there’s no way of knowing if it’s the shit you’re looking for.

  

Perhaps it was slightly ill conceived to have built the final metaphor around investigating faeces.  Too late now.