If this is your first visit, welcome! This is an archive page. Get with the times!

At least two votes have been lost because of Tom Watson's language in recent days. And he just won't learn. Tom says:

Maybe I should stir up a debate more often, if only to wind up lib dems in the heat of a by-election.

Oh well Tom. It's your votes; lose them if you want to! As Mr Wallace says,

I voted for Labour at the last election but after Tom's remarks they'll never be getting my vote again...

Tom, I think you and your damn party must be sick in the head. Legalisation wouldn't make drugs go away but nothing will so legalisation is probably the best solution because it allows the problem to be managed and the profits could go to medical treatment instead of organised crime. The situation we have today is not to different to 1920's America and the bath tub gin under the prohibitionists.

Tom, I think you're mean spirted and horriblw; so would most people if they read what you wrote...

CAN SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHEN THE LABOUR PARTY BECAME A HOME FOR RIGHT-WING REACTIONARIES???????

If Tom Watson hates the Lib Dems so much, he really ought not to serve them such opportunities on a silver platter..

This negative campaigning lark gets more credit than it's due, really..

The way I see things, Watson's decided that he hates the Lib Dems, and then tried to look for a reason to hate them. Most other people try liking New Labour and actually discover many reasons for hating them..

Tom Watson's dislike of Liberal Democrats is turning into paranoia.

I know the Lib Dems will say anything and do anything in an election, but to hog the comments section of a weblog to undermine a campaign is a fresh low.

Which, uh, is a comment I don't understand, and I don't think anybody else does either, looking at the comments, which is filled with people saying, "I'm not a Lib Dem."

Infact, I don't think I've ever seen Tom's comment box with such a high proportion of people disagreeing with him. Indeed, the only person who sort of half sticked up for him has had everybody disagreeing with him aswell. As sonofglyndwr says,

Tom is whining and making silly over the top comments cos the by-election is not going well for Labour.....

Meanwhile, Nick proposes a Watson watch!

NP Everything In Its Right Place [live] Radiohead - a song for crack heads and junkies only

According to currybet, who should know, Thompson is going to be closing sections of the world's best website.

All I would say is that we're in the middle of a dry run, applying the test according to the principles set out in Building Public Value to our online services.

Interestingly, although much of the BBC's online offering has passed the test, not all of it has.

As a result, we intend to announce the closure of some of the BBC's online sites within the next few weeks.

NP Living Life Prefuse 73

As I said, I had a funny night last night. My dream was fantastic. Too often these days I pay no attention to my dreams, although I am fascinated by them. But I just couldn't avoid thinking again about the dream I had last night.

For the second night running, my dream took place in the same town. It was incredibly detailed, and for a long time I was actually trying to work out whether or not it was a real town. I came to the conclusion that it wasn't. Last night it was known as 'Hull' in my dream, although I doubt that it's very similar to the real Hull.

What's even more incredible is the fact that I am 100% positive that I've had a dream in this town before, a very long time ago.. Possibly as much as ten years ago. For it to crop up again for two days in a row is just very strange.

But this is why I love dreams so much!

It was raining very heavily in 'Hull', which was fun, because I quite like the rain sometimes.. Of course, it was the real rain pattering on the Velux window which eventually properly woke me up. It was extremely heavy; I've never heard rain like it! It's a shame I woke up though, because we were about to head off to the other side of the town, which I've never been in.. I always turned left at the bottom of the hill.. Of course, now that I've thought deeply and written about it I'll never have a dream in this town again.

NP Uneasy Listening Plaid

I had a bit of a funny night's sleep [more on that in the next post]. But I'm also quite tired because I went on another walk with Alan and David.

The original plan was to climb up Largo Law. However, we still haven't worked out how you can get up it. So we went in the opposite direction instead. This involved walking through grassy areas. Given that it's been raining heavily, this involved getting very wet.My feet were absolutely soaking, and they're still itching a wee bit.

I've only got a few pictures to show you, cos the battery died after just the third picture. I alway have terrible luck with batteries. I went through about ten different ones earlier today to try and find a pair that worked, and they only lasted for three pictures! Grr.


Anyway, here are some strange looking trees...


...and a pathway with David and Alan on it.

Just over a week ago now, I said that I'd become more sympathetic towards Labour. This week, though, I've swung in the complete opposite direction. I wouldn't even describe myself as a 'floating voter' any more.

For instance, Tom Watson pointed out that the Liberal Democrats support the idea that people should be allowed to watch what they're legally allowed to do. Watson, of course, is too busy irrationally foaming at the mouth about the Lib Dems to think this through properly. He thinks that 16-year-olds should not be allowed to watch pornography, despite the fact that they can have as much sex as they want to anyway.

Lib Dem Watch, meanwhile, is really scraping the barrel by criticising Lib Dem's Hodge Hill by-election candidate Nicola Davies for daring to be photographed in front of a bush. Not only this, but they've criticised the Lib Dems for setting up their Hodge Hill campaign HQ in a video shop. I must say, such heinous crimes have surely put many people off voting Lib Dem forever.

Then, of course, there are those who criticise the Lib Dems for daring to try and form a coalition when there was no outright winner in an election.

Yet, there's been surprisingly little on the reasons why people should vote Labour instead.

And these people have the cheek to accuse the Lib Dems of negative campaigning.

All the while, David Blunkett has been demonstrating the ugly, authoritarian side of Labour by using new powers to demand the sacking of a police chief, and even threatening legal action over the matter. This is an approach which has the support of nobody. It just goes to prove that the Labour government has given itself too much power over matters which are frankly none of its business.

I was prepared to forgive Labour over the Iraq war. I thought it was just a blip. And besides, Tony Blair allowed the Commons to vote on the matter, which was unprecedented. Whilst most are upset with Blair, it's the others who are making me annoyed with Labour.

NP Stars Brian Eno

I've always found it strange that some people ignore the word 'the' when sorting things by alphabetical order. What did the word 'the' do to be ignored so? :(

I discovered today that bands that begin with the word 'the' have the word 'the' ignored by iTunes. WEIRDO APPLE.

Why?

You don't file 'Aphex Twin' under T for 'Twin'. So why file 'The Connells' under C for 'Connells'? 'THE' HAS FEELINGS ASWELL YOU KNOW.

Jade Farrington wonders about this aswell. She is wrong, I tell thee.

I mean, tell me. TELL ME. People say 'The Doves' when they actually mean 'Doves'. Nobody EVER says 'The Radiohead', they just say 'Radiohead'. So why do they say 'The Doves' or 'The Eels'? The bands are called 'Doves' and 'Eels', no 'the' required. 'The Chemical Brothers', though, yes. It says 'The Chemical Brothers' on the spine. It doesn't say 'Chemical Brothers'. It says 'The Chemical Brothers' dammit.

I go with what it says on the spine, and not what I imgaine the band might be called in my head.

Thank you for your attention. Bye. :D

If you see some guy whose screen name reminds you of mine adding you, it probably is actually me. My handle thingy is now the same as my email address [which you can find on the left hand side], to stop any confusion about what my email address is.

It also allows me to be really smug about having a Gmail account.

NP Me And Giuliani Down By The School Yard (A True Story) !!!

Yet again, the Glastonbury lineup succeeds to send me into a coma. But Oasis headlining?! That really takes the biscuit. I was hardly even aware that they still existed.. Do people really still care about these people?

Update
Having said that, I'm seriously digging what's on BBCi right now. The audio is from the Radio 1 Dance Tent, which is sounding super. The visuals are being mixed live by some bloke called Charles Kriel, who has been called "the world's first superstar VJ". Very impressive stuff, I can hardly tear myself away from the screen.

From BBC News Online:

UKIP's funds will be boosted by the fact that the party's team will sit in Strasbourg as part of a bigger multi-national bloc of MEPs.

As a result, it will receive extra cash for secretarial and administrative back-up.

What's that? UKIP using that dirty EU money in a bureaucratic way?

Mark Croucher, UKIP's affable press officer... tells me he is off to load up on "cheap fags and booze" before heading back to Blighty.

Something tells me they haven't quite thought this through...

Via Alister, a very interesting piece about why English nationalism is acceptable.

...what is being celebrated is English and not British nationalism, and this has been a development of really just the last 15 years. This is a complex phenomenon that needs separate examination; however it is my view that English nationalism is not necessarily more reactionary than Welsh or Scottish nationalism. Certainly the myth that England supporters are more right-wing than Scottish ones needs to be punctured, I have heard Scottish fans chanting "there's only one Bomber Harris" at the Germans.

English nationalism is arguably a less virulent strain than British nationalism, and perhaps is more racially inclusive. I have been surprised to see so many young Asian men wearing England replica shirts this year... I am making no claim that it is progressive, but it is a new development that needs more than a knee-jerk reaction. Many of the people displaying England flags will be opposed to the war in Iraq, and anti-racist.

So if you like sport, enjoy the tournament. If you find the excessive show of nationalism oppressive, welcome to the club! - But it is not the return of the third Reich.

NP Radar Garden Team Doyobi

Children should be kept away from fans.

NP The Rooster OutKast

The thing England did wrong was score first.

I learned this on a phone-in on Up All Night last night. Apparently, no teams have successfully defended a lead. The only team that has has been Portugal, who won 1-0 against Spain who were going for a draw.

Scotland know this already.

NP The Way You Move OutKast featuring Sleepy Brown

I like this from Re.engage:

...why on earth did Michael Howard, the alternative brain to run the country, stand up yesterday in the House of Commons and say that a constitution is something that applies only to nation states. Excuse me? Councils, Trade Unions, Bridge Clubs, Charities, Youth Organisations, the UN, political parties - his own political party. Oh dear. In a debate about myths and realities we're not going to get very far if blatant, and dare I say, desperate appeals to clearly disprovable 'facts' are to be made.

Meanwhile, via Conservative Commentary, Trevor Kavanagh is making up a few myths of his own.

MYTH: 3 million UK jobs depend on EU membership.
FACT: We buy more from the EU than vice-versa.

Ehh, would that be anything to do with the fact that there are many more people living in the EU as there are in the UK? Of course we buy more from the EU than the EU buys from us - there's far more of the EU to buy from!

MYTH: Unless we join the Euro, our economy will suffer.
FACT: "Since we were bundled out of single currency preparations in 1992, Britain has enjoyed a record 12 straight years of growth," says Kavenagh.

That's a bit like saying, "Since I picked my nose in 1992, Britain has enjoyed a record 12 straight years of growth."

MYTH: The Union has given us 60 years of peace in Europe.
FACT: Kavenagh says it was the US and Nato who ended the Cold War and resolved the Kosovo mess when the EU dithered.

Who ever said anything about the Cold War or Kosovo? Since when were Russia and Kosovo part of the EU?

Well at least his final point has a bit of truth in it.

MYTH: The EU does not promote daft rules like demanding "straight bananas".
FACT: Kavenagh quotes chapter and verse: "'Bananas must be free from abnormal curvature of the fingers' says Commission Regulation 2257, Quality Standards for Bananas."

The problem is that UK firms exporting to the EU would still have to keep to these 'daft rules' whether they were in the EU or not. The only difference would be that the UK wouldn't have a say in them. Still, one out of four ain't bad Trev.

NP 99 Problems Dangermouse

It's freezing cold. Bucketing outside. I've had several sneezing fits already today. And we've just put the central heating on. Bah.

NP Take Off Your Cool OutKast featuring Norah Jones

So says Ron Neil in his review of the BBC.

YUSS.

NP Prototype OutKast

First of all they bought a paper called The European and turned it into an anti-European paper. It closed down. Then they bought The Scotsman and turned it into a Thatcherite newspaper, lining it up with about two real Scotsmen. Its sales plummeted.

Now the Barclay brothers have bought The Telegraph.

What are Williams thinking of?! According to The Guardian, Jacques Villeneuve is set to stand in for Ralf Schumacher, who looks like he's going to miss the French Grand Prix due to his huge crash at Indianapolis on Sunday.

Why?

So they're going to be replacing one overrated, overpaid, underperforming windbag with another overrated, overpaid, underperforming windbag who hasn't driven an F1 car for eight months. What a genius solution; at least it's consistent.

Do they not remember Marc Gené's performance at least year's Italian Grand Prix?

NP Pink & Blue OutKast

I never thought he was a good leader. It has been obvious for a long time that Swinney was a poor leader for the SNP. They haven't had a single good election result under him. The final straw was, in an election which was seen as disastrous for Labour, being unable to displace them at the top for the European elections in Scotland. Indeed, the SNP's share of the vote decreased.

Incidentally, I started to hate the SNP when Swinney was leader.

Despite this, Kirsten Campbell, BBC Scotland's own Andrew Gilligan, has managed to write this load of bile:

I have never met anyone who does not like John Swinney.

He is a nice man, an honourable man...

Blearugh. He's Scotland's equivalent of Iain Duncan Smith for crying out loud! He was far too opportunistic. On a scale of 1-10, he is Michael Howard. Not my idea of 'honourable'.

I think you can lay the reason for the perception of the Scottish Parliament as childish and useless at the doorstep of Swinney. You half expected him to end his overblown speeches by saying, "Oh, and Jack McConnell is a stupid poo." Not that I've ever done any of that on this blog, oh no...

The SNP's most reasonable politician, Alex Salmond, is of course not interested, having resigned as leader back in 2000 and never looked back. Besides, Salmond isn't even an MSP, so they'd have to get a different leader in the Scottish Parliament anyway.

Which leaves Rosanna Cunningham and the condescending Nicola Sturgeon, who in another world would be presenting the 6 O'Clock News. I certainly struggle to think of any other SNP MSPs.

John Swinney undoubtedly lost the SNP votes. But I can't think of anybody from the SNP who could gain them back. But I don't know an awful lot about Scottish politics...

NP Roses OutKast

Well, you know what the internet is like. It seems steam-driven half the time. But it appears that the problem at Harry's Place is permanent. Although you'll already know this because you'd rightly be reading normblog, Gauche, or What You Can Get Away With [brilliant post] before reading doctorvee. Well done!

Quite a shame though; it's a really good blog, even if it's a bit obsessed with a rather meaningless and unimportant section of the 'left'.

I've tried to play my part, by looking at the Wayback Machine results but there are shockingly few results.

NP Ms. Jackson OutKast

Nope, I'm not blogging about that awesome thing which I thought of during my last post. I decided it was too boring. [Actually, I'll wait until it's something which I'm worrying about again.

So today I finally got round to tidying / reorganising my room. Except, I've kind of realised that the old system actually worked. As you can see by the picture, there is now lots of stuff on my bed because I can't think where to put them. There are also half-bare shelves and near-empty drawers.

I had moved some of my CDs to where the rest of them were, and then realised that nothing else would fit on the small bookcase where they used to go. So back they went. My very small vinyl collection now has a space on the shelf, although the 12"s won't fit in vertically, so this is not a good enough solution.

I've never been able to find somewhere to put my vinyl, ever since I got my first 12". I bought some silly Ikea shelf thingy which was made out of the sort of thing you're more likely to see tents made out of. I've not managed to find a place for it to go up. Grr. Cool supplements from The Guardian [you know, the type that previews France 98] have been moved two shelves up, but the magazines which used to accompany them will probably now go to the 'annexe'.

The 'annexe' is the solution to everything though. It's a bit like an attic really, because it's just a separate wee room next door to my bedroom. But one of my parents' bright ideas was to turn it into a proper room. I quickly discovered that they wanted somewhere to dump a spare - fusty - mattress, old duvets and beanbags, whilst making it look like they were giving me a kind present of a mattress and some beanbags. And so I dump stuff in there aswell. An old Macintosh SE. My stamp collection [which I got bored of, and haven't even looked at for the past five-or-so years]. My collection of F1 Racing and PlayStation World magazines, and the posters which came with them. Old Fighting Fantasy and Choose Your Own Adventure books [c'mon, I don't wanna look like some role-player geek if some hott person happens to stumble into my room - and I haven't even finished any of them, or even started most of them]. The problem now is that it's now almost 100% full - although today I've managed to tidy it so that you can at least enter it without trampling on a fifteen year old printer or slipping on a beanbag.

I don't have a clue where I'm going to keep old school stuff.. Modern Studies, Physics booklets and the like. Everybody seems to think I should chuck them out [and yet keep the stamp collection which I'll never look at again?!] even though they're just about the only useful things I've got.

All the dust is quite disgusting. I've been sent into several sneezing fits. Eurgh.

And I'm only half done. Tomorrow I'm going to clear out the space on top of the wardrobe [masks required], and also look in the bureau, aswell as find places to put the stuff on my bed [the floor looks like a nice option for tonight].

And yet this feels like a very modest reorganisation compared to the ones I used to do about five years ago. This is before having the internet, and when the only thing which could keep me occupied was to move furniture about the place - so the room sometimes changed on an almost fornightly basis. But things haven't really changed for, I reckon, about two years now, so I've obviously struck gold with the present layout.

It doesn't stop me from having to chuck out shite though.

Okay, so I'm becoming a bit bored of writing blogs, and a bit bored of reading them aswell. To many bloggers this would lead them to shout from the rooftops about how they're going to take a 'hiatus'. Often it only takes a few days for them to come back. Whoa man, four days ago I began a hiatus!

Anyway, I like to say that there are no rules to blogging. But I like to stick to two golden rules in particular.

1. Don't write anything which is either obvious or boring
   Yah, well this one is bloody obvious if you want anybody to keep on reading your blog. But I fear that I fall into the trap all too often. I used to blog about politics loads, and by now I'm quite sure that most of you lot are already well acquainted with my politics, and you could easily find what I think written better elsewhere. School is over. Piano is almost over. So I have no real responsibilities any more; I sit on my bum all day. I don't do some weird job. I'm not dying of cancer. All of this makes a very boring blog. And who wants one of those? So if I think I'll be boring you, I just won't bother.
2. Don't worry about not blogging enough, or blogging too much
   Sometimes I used to sit and try to think of something to blog about. And other times I post about ten posts in a day and think I've gone way over the top. But nowadays I don't think either of these things matter. If I don't have anything to blog about, I won't blog about it. And if I've got loads to blog about, I'm gonna blog about it.

So apologies to those of you who come along expecting to find some deep insightful insight into .. whatever it is you come here for. I don't have it just now, hence the blogging-lite.

Yeah, I know I've now got three posts today. But both of them were quite contrived really. Especially the football one. I just wanted something to blog about! [Yes, I broke one of my golden rules.]

I'm actually keeping myself busy though with mundane tasks which I've already described.

The really ironic thing is that while I was writing this post I just thought of something amazing which I could blog about. So there you go! I'll wait until later on to do it though, just to keep you all on the edge of yer seats.

NP Not Ready Yet Eels

Euro 2004 eh? This summer I've found out that I'm pure rubbish at predicting scores. I've only got 9 points out of a possible 48. I've only got one result correct [Germany 1 - 1 Netherlands]!

I also missed what everybody's saying has been the best match so far. Which pisses me off a bit. I'm not mad on football, but I wanna see a good game.

Last night I was thinking, what is my most vivid football memory? Why, it's Des Lynam telling everybody that Ronaldo was not on the team sheet for the final of France 98. And then that he was again. Very bizarre and exciting. Though obviously Ronaldo probably didn't think so...

NP The Way You Move OutKast featuring Sleepy Brown

Sorry for the lack of blogging. I really can't think of anything to write about!

Anyway, this is an appeal to anybody who likes COOL MUSIC, and who I actually know. That narrows it down to about zero.

Nevertheless, I desperately want to see Tortoise. The last time I went to a concert was two years ago, Warp Records' Magic Bus Tour. I went on my own, and all I did was stand in the corner stroking my beard. The only person I talked to was somebody who wanted to know how to spell 'cushion'. Some people actually came up to me to see if I was alright. Inside, I was having a whale of a time, obviously, but I found it a bit of a culture shock. I've only ever been to two gigs EVER. [The other one was My Vitriol / Mo*Ho*Bish*O*Pi / Thirteen:13.] Moshing and / or dancing is not my niche.

Anyway, in short I'd like somebody who'd at least help make me not look as much of a spoddy no-friends [not that I am, of course]. [Also, I'm scared that I'll fuck everything up with the trains, cos I'm paranoid about that sort of thing, and I don't really want to be hanging around outside in Glasgow for a whole night.] I've been asking around for months [I mean months] and nobody has made it 100% firm that they can go with me.

SO. If I've actually met you, and you like COOL MUSIC - and let's face it, it doesn't get very much cooler than Tortoise - and you can come to The Arches in Glasgow on Tuesday the 29th June at 8:30pm [£12], for goodness sake tell me. I missed out with The Matthew Herbert Big Band, and I really don't want to miss an opportunity to see Tortoise.

NP Styles That Fade Away With A Collonade Reprise Prefuse 73

For the first nine hours of today, I didn't feel very hungry. Indeed, I didn't eat breakfast until 4 o'clock [I got up at 12:30]. I'm not usually big on breakfast, but today was just in another league. After that, I survived on an M&S cherry scone. I didn't want dinner, because it was lamb mince which I think tastes.. mince.

And ever since then I've been absolutely starving.

My big plan whenever I'm hungry is to do something with eggs. I go through a bit of an egg obsession every now and again. At one point, it was boiled eggs with soldiers. For a while it was poached egg sandwiches. Now it's ommelette.

But disaster. There was only one egg. I was a bit tempted to have some pasta though. So I thought I'd have a go at a variation of the spag carb recipe in the Get Stuffed cookbook. From memory. It was just a mug full of pasta [cos it was only one egg] a rasher of bacon and an egg. Oh, and milk. That was the killer one. Milk and pasta just do not mix. I know this, I've tried it several times. I don't know why I put milk in. I was only going to put a wee splash in aswell. But you know what it's like if the carton's empty; you've just got to pour the lot of it in.

The result was a horrific off-white gloop. It didn't taste too bad at the top, but when it got to the bottom, where the pasta was absolutely soaking in the stuff, I just couldn't take any more, and had to put it in the bin.

I ended up having a bacon roll instead. This was also a failure, as I put far too much margarine on it.

When I was writing my previous post I suddenly got a bit of a cough and I've been feeling a bit ill ever since, and I'm blaming it on my evil concoction. I've been drinking loads of water to neutralise this. I've been addicted to water of late. So addicted infact, that I'm sure it's making me ill aswell. I occasionally need to go on a good old walk in order to 'walk it all off'. So I've been downing this water, which makes me feel ill after a wee while, and this evil pasta thingy which has also made me feel ill.

What can you have to eat and drink if you can't have water and pasta?!

I'm still starving aswell you know. My body, it's 100% evil.

I phoned up my piano teacher today, because he asked me to. And after telling him the story of my mediocre performance, I let it out that I wanted to pack it in - if I got a bad result, I said.

He obviously does not want me to quit. He said, "At this level?!" Obviously if you go on past about Grade 3 or 4 you've been doing it for so long that you're expected to stick with it forever. But it's no real fun to play the piano any more. Besideswhich, I don't think I'll have much time once I start university.

I never play the piano for the fun of it. I never hear a tune and think, "Oh goodness, I wish I could play that!" I actually had to be reminded by my guidance teacher that it's a hobby [she asked me what my hobbies were, and I said I didn't know. When I mentioned the fact that I had to go upstairs every lunchtime to practice percussion she said, "Well, that's a hobby." I thought, "It's just more bloody schoolwork."]

Despite rarely practicing, I was good at it. It was the only thing I was good at. Indeed, it was the only thing I did. It looks good on your CV. "Plays the piano and enjoys socialising" looks much better than "Enjoys socialising and masturbates the rest of the time." I don't think I have any real hobbies apart from piano. That's what stopped me from quitting at Grade 4, which was the original compromise struck between me and my parents. It's what made me want to carry on.

Except Grade 6 is just so pretentious and poncy. I've never known why I need to do so many stupid scales [surely just one will do, if it's really just for warming up, as they claim] and the amount of idiotic scales which don't even sound nice which I have to play at this level is just awful. It totals 84 infact - and that doesn't include the various permutations, such as hands seperately / together, or which key the chromatic scales begin on. I even have to sight sing [in a PIANO exam, remember]. In short, I've reached my limit with the piano. It gets in the way of everything, and with university coming up I surely can't afford to waste 30 minutes or more per day practicing the piano when I could be studying.

A few things.

Firstly, I think I've become a bit tired of blogging about politics. I think this is partly because all I can think about is UKIP, and I've bored the entire world at least twenty times about that. So in brief, I'll sum my political feelings up: For some reason which I can't put my finger on, I've found myself feeling a lot more sympathetic towards Labour [just when I started the Lewis Moonie blog, huh?]. Perhaps it's because I've realised who the true enemy is?

Right. Now I find myself in one of those moods where I want a fresh start. School's finished. You know all about that.

Piano's finished. Almost. More about that in the next post.

Although, there is always one more thing which needs to be done. Up until Tuesday I had the piano exam hanging over me. Yesterday and today I've been getting my passport photo taken and sent off to the university for my ID card-o-rama. This evening I was reminded that I have to apply for whatever student loany things I'll be getting [despite the fact that I'll still be living at home; nice one, mum]. Then I'll have to try and find a job, which is just my idea of hell [I mean, what can I put on a CV, huh?!]. I'm not complaining though. These little bits of responsibility stop me from feeling worthless, which is usually a problem during school holidays.

But now I want to completely reorganise myself. One of those little periods, which I still get from time to time, where I just get the overwhelming urge to reinvent myself. This will be a subtle one though, I think. Infact, I won't be growing my hair long [or chopping it all off], changing my taste in music or opting to change all my clothes. But I just wanna tidy up. Chuck stuff out, and fill those drawers and dusty shelves with something more useful, and something that feels more like me. When Alan was at my house, he decided to inspect just about every object on my bookcase. I don't mind this of course, but I didn't think what he saw tallied with what I am. And it's all very dusty indeed.

I'm also tidying up the computer, and chucking out useless files. And, of course [and here's the money sentence], I'll be updating the whole site so that it looks like the blog. 'Hurrahs' all round then. Hurrah!

Something which had been confusing me was, I think, sorted last night. It's all cool, but not that cool. If ya get what I mean.

Thanks to everybody who helped me out!

[Woo, I haven't been cryptic like that for a while!]

NP Valley Doves

I ain't buying it. As had been suspected by most, it appears to be heavily biased in favour of the editors' friends and opinions.

But this really takes this biscuit - from an MSN conversation with Jon:

Jon - The yearbook is a collection of fascist bullshit. says:
very, very pissed off
\•/ \F/ says:
oh man!
\•/ \F/ says:
how come?
Jon - The yearbook is a collection of fascist bullshit. says:
yearbook - guess who they forgot to add to the personal statements list
[...]
Jon - The yearbook is a collection of fascist bullshit. says:
The thing is, I doubt I'm the only one

This guy has added another whole dimension to school for me and many others. His role to play was significant. And almost everybody I knew put Jon as 'most underrated'. But it appears the overrated can also be nominated for most underrated.

No doubt this mini-tirade from me will result in howls from certain egotists saying that I'm "self-obsessed" for daring to have an opinion. Well look who has opinions now - it appears to be the editors of the yearbook, who have decided to wipe some people from our year completely.

NP Crunch Doves

UPDATE
Here is Jon's statement
And here is what Kristi has to say on the matter

This from Guardian Unlimited:

Gmail grey market goes into freefall
June 11: As reported here a couple of weeks ago, the intense buzz around Google's new Gmail service - so far enjoyed by specially invited users only - had led to something of a grey market in subscription applications.Of course, as booms go, this was always going to be short-lived because Google always made clear that the service would be free for everyone, eventually.Well, now it seems, as the time for the full release of Gmail draws near, the market for 'invitations' has crashed.

NP Circlewave Squarepusher

I went along to West Wemys again today, this time with Alan, David and Kirsty. We walked in the opposite direction to last time [ie. towards Kirkcaldy]. It was very good fun; many funny stories which we will no doubt be looking back on. The best was probably when David felt the need to adjust his pants, and went to what he thought was a private corner - only for some guy to start peering over the wall! The person must have kept on watching for about thirty seconds. In typical David style, he was completely oblivious to the whole situation until we told him..

The pictures didn't come out as well as I'd hoped. :/

West Wemyss from a distance.


Nothing from a distance. The setting sun looked lovely on the River Forth, but unfortunately the lovely little glints weren't picked up by the camera. You can faintly see Lothian on the horizon.


Seeing this probably told us that we'd walked too far!

I had planned to take a picture of the people, but it slipped my mind. I was taking a picture of distant trees [which in the end came out so badly it was dumped altogether], and apparently they were all posing cos they thought I was taking a picture of them!

Never mind though.

It was good to see Kirsty again; I had been paranoid that she wasn't speaking to me! Talking to her has helped clear my mind about a certain situation a bit. It's a shame we couldn't speak for longer though.. the conversation was too rushed and I think some important information was left out...

Right, yeah yeah, you're bored. But not as bored as I was when I did this:

Tomorrow I may well be sorting them by flavour.

I've just had my piano exam, and I bombed.

It all started off badly when I struggled to wake up. I knew this would happen, following yesterday morning's rude interruption. Getting up early for one morning is far too easy. Getting up early for two mornings in a row is a near impossibility. I had planned to wake up at 9 o'clock, but it was well after 10 o'clock until I felt good enough to stumble out of bed. I didn't have time for a proper breakfast, and practicing went badly.

When I first sat down at the piano in the exam, the examiner asked me to fiddle about and get used to the keys, which completely threw me. I've never been asked to do that before. I just pretended I cared, and played a bit of the B major scale. Then for my first scale he asked me to play B major. I thought, "but you just heard most of it." I don't think any of the scales were good enough. Fingering or timing or just plain wrong notes, something went wrong. He even asked me if I wanted to start again for one of them. I'll have passed the scales bit, but not by much I don't think.

The pieces weren't much better. Almost as soon as I started Andante Amoroso I felt like I was far too close to the piano, so I spent the whole time feeling uncomfortable. It didn't go well enough, although better than yesterday's mock exam. Columbine Dances wasn't perfect either, and I had to stop a couple of times to get the right note. I even made a mistake in Nuances.

Then it was the aural tests. Singing from memory wasn't too bad, I don't think. Singing from score was the usual - except even worse. He asked if I wanted to sing from the treble or bass clef and obviously I chose bass. Except I then realised that it was too low! So I sang an octave up, which was actually too high. And as usual it seemed to start off not too badly, but completely disintegrated as I just started mumbling something which might or might not have been the tune, like a primary school kid being forced to sing hymns at the school service.

And then it was questions on a piece. I'm good at that bit! Eh, no. He played what I thought sounded like was a chordal piece all the way through - and then he said, "The texture changed from the beginning in the second half of the piece. What was different about the texture?" HOLY FUCK. The only thing I could think of was to say, "Well it was bassy to start with and then ended up on the right hand, but I know that's not what you're asking me." He just asked me again what I thought happened to the texture, and I had to say, "I thought it was chordal all the way through." Waah.

Sight reading was my usual - something like what it was supposed to sound like, but at the same time nothing like what it was supposed to sound like.

I had to get up early for that. And now I'm seriously drained. Never mind. This is the end of the piano. Ever. I'm now listening to Manitoba to try and cheer me up.

NP Kid You'll Move Mountains Manitoba

I'd put this in the linklog, but this is just too satisfying.

Here's what Robert Kilroy-Silk had to say about the success of UKIP in this year's European Parliamentary elections:

I think it's a clear message that when Tony Blair talks about wanting to be at the heart of Europe, the people here are saying very clearly 'Tone, if you want to be at the heart of Europe fine, you go - we don't want to.'

I think a very large proportion of the British electorate want their country back and they don't want to be governed by a remote, corrupt bureaucracy in Brussels.

So what is that 'large proportion' of the British electorate?

Uhm, actually, it's 6.8%.

I'm sure Tone's quaking in his boots.

NP Di Do Sigur Rós

If you can't, she was the BNP councillor who wasn't formally a member of the BNP and wasn't even aware of their policies.

She's now joined the Labour party.

NP P Labradford

Since I was so negative about Scottish Wind Watch [without actually being an expert on energy], and for some reason managed to get to become the top result in Google for Scottish Wind Watch, I think it's fair they get to have their say on this blog.

Brendan Hamill, the convener of Scottish Wind Watch, emailed me today. He asked if I know where Clatto Hill is. I have to say that I didn't; and I can't see it from my house, cos loads of other houses are in the way.. But I'm intrigued now and maybe I'll give it a visit sometime.

Have a look at this website from the Clatto Land Protection Group - and why not Scottish Wind Watch?

NP C Labradford

I seem to have been asked this a lot today [unlike previous weeks], so I might aswell get it all over and done with!

I got 104/150 in my mock piano exam today [you need 100 to pass] - cutting it a bit fine. The exam itself is tomorrow, so scary stuff.

I had to walk all the way back from the other side of town. I got pissed off with myself when I must have walked about half a mile before realising there was a much quicker way I could have gone, which didn't involve either going uphill nor going about half a mile out of the way. What an arse [me].

NP Weaken Not, For You Are The Magma Team Doyobi

The death [for the time being] of Blog:Vote has given me a good opportunity to update the old blogroll, which I've been meaning to do for a while. Has your blod been added? Probably not, because there's no such thing as a 'blod' [as far as I know].


Meanwhile, I've eaten a fish. It was a big fish. And I'm not sure if it was cooked enough. Ewwrgh.

NP Mod Truckin' Team Doyobi

The results of Anthony Wells' European election prediction contest are out. I was 14 off, which puts me somewhere in the middle. Considering that both the Conservatives and Labour did far worse than expected, I don't feel too bad about that. The winner, Young Fogey, rather scarily got the Conservatives', Labour's and the Liberal Democrats' number of seats correct. Nobody guessed UKIP's 12 seats [although one did guess at 17 -- huh??!?] This all goes to show you, that YouGov probably aren't that bad after all..

NP Maphive 6.1 Autechre

Yes, I am awake at 10am. I was even awake at 9am. What is that all about?

I'LL F@$&%ING TELL YOU WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT - It's all about GORDON and his stinking FREE PERIODS, and deciding to INVITE HIS FRIENDS ROUND, which meant the doorbell RINGING THREE TIMES [cos he's too stupid to take his keys and open the fucking door himself] and then his pals shouting at the TOPS OF THEIR VOICES.

YUSS.

Mind you, at least I actually had to get up early [not this early though], cos I've got my final mock piano exam [and probably my final piano lesson ever] at 12:45am. I've got to get a taxi on the way up, but I'm walking on the way back down, cos even though it's two miles away at the opposite end of the town, it's almost all downhill, and I like a good walk.


I had a reasonably good weekend. Although I felt ill for most of Sunday [I maintain that it was more to do with the heat than it was to do with the drink], it turned out to be quite enjoyable aswell. The race was alright. I went up to Alan's house during the first half of England vs. France and watched the second half up there. Even though I said I'll support England during Euro 2004, I found myself being more of a neutral because I'm fed up with all of the English media thinking they're going to win. I don't think they're going to win. Rooney was also being a very dirty player; he was going to get himself sent off. A very exciting match towards the end, even if I had to endure contrived celebrations from people who think they have to support whoever's playing England just because.. they're playing England.

I made another compilation, unofficially called Duncan S Loses Another Potential Friend.


Finally, a wee word on politics. The media [and blog] coverage had suggested to me that the Greens were the fourth party of the London Assembly; that Darren Johnson was the biggest 'small' candidate. So how come he managed to finish 7th, behind the BNP and even Respect?! I suppose he had lots of second preferences..

Meanwhile, the people of the East Midlands have predictably decided to elect a man who said he's going to stay as much time away from the European Parliament as possible. What a good plan! One down, eleven to go.

NP Chouax Bomber Team Doyobi

It's a FujiFilm Finepix A210, in case you're interested. Quite impressive.

This means that you'll probably be bombarded with tons of useless photos for about three days, until I get bored of it and never touch the camera again for years.

Today I thought I'd introduce you to my plants.


When I started getting plants, my mother, for some strange reason, was desperate for me to give the big one a name. To annoy her, I gave it a really stupid name - s = ut + ¹/₂at². It's dead now though. I decided this naming lark was quite fun, so I gave them all names. The plant you see above is Rothko II. The original Rothko died [as you can tell, I'm dead good at taking care of them!]. It's my favourite plant. Just so damn cool. So cool, I named it Rothko. Why Rothko? Cos there is a cool painter called Rothko, a cool bass guitar trio called Rothko and a cool short film with a dog called Rothko in it. In short, Rothko is all-round cool. When Rothko's bark became as squidgy as an over-ripe banana, we got a similar [but not quite as cool] plant, and I called it Rothko II.


This is one of the later plants I got. I really wanted a cactus with attitude. David wanted to name this one, and he called it Sonny Van Lord. I have no idea.


Mum said this was a 'peace plant', so I called this one Hippy IV. There were no Hippy I-IIIs; I just decided to call it Hippy IV. It had pretty flowers, but through a bad patch it lost the flowers, and they've never come back.


This one is called Holy Cow! That Sun Just Rose In The West. It's a bit like Rothko II, except without that bad-ass bark.


I don't think I named this one. Everybody says it looks like it's dying, and they're right. Except it's been like that ever since I had it, and it's never died, so.. It's in a really bad location, cramped up on the bureau underneath the velux window. When the curtains are closed they cram the plant in even further. I don't have anywhere else to put it. By now I have too many plants.

NP 21st Century Pop Song Hymie's Basement

So Tim Ireland's "Big Intervention" is underway. Out of the goodness of my heart, I'll link to it.

But stop and think. I mean, really think what getting rid of Tony Blair would result in. Think. Nope? I'll do it for you.

Q: Are things better under Blair than we were under Major?
A: Yes

Q: Would things be better under Brown than they are under Blair?
A: Probably not

Q: Does Brown have the same appeal in 'Middle England' as Blair?
A: No

Q: Would 'Middle England' vote for Brown over Howard?
A: No

Q: Would Brown win a general election for Labour?
A: Probably not

Q: Even if he did, would things be much different to the way they are under Blair?
A: No

Q: Would things be better under Howard than they would be under Brown?
A: No

Q: Would things be better under Blair than they would be under Howard?
A: Yes


I wanted Blair and Labour to get a kick up the arse. They've got it. I'm happy. Now let's move on, because leadership change really isn't a good idea.

I thought, now that it's morning [okay okay, afternoon] and that a fuller picture of the results is beginning to emerge, that I'd like to comment a bit more.

It appears to me as though Labour have lost it. They have lost it badly. When I saw the BBC's projected result showing that Labour were going to finish third [and not a close third either], I didn't believe it. I was a bit pissed off at the BBC's coverage, although I understand that a lot of this is to do with [sometimes suspiciously] high turnouts which meant that far fewer results than were expected came in. [Incidentally, while we're on the BBC's coverage, when the coverage switched over from the so-called dedicated Vote 2004 operation to BBC News 24 doing their own stuff, coverage improved significantly. Hrmph.]

But now it appears that the BBC's projection was correct. Labour have lost. But neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats have won. BBC Radio Five Live just reported that the Conservatives got as much of the vote as William Hague did. That doesn't sound like a good result to me. And as for the Liberal Democrats, they have clearly got a huge proportion of the votes. But that's not what counts. They've lost councils, which looks very bad on pretty maps like this.

Look at this table. I'm not too sure about the accuracy of this. I had my suspicions about this last night. But it's the only one I can find at the moment. Labour still have the most amount of councillors! Okay, so losing 222 isn't exactly the way to go about things. But I don't think this is the complete collapse that most people are making it out to be.

Of course, though, there are still tons of results to come in, and it's difficult to get a proper picture of what's happened until Monday morning. So we'll wait and see, I guess.

NP Baby Said Hot Chip

Well well well. It's just been announced on the BBC's coverage that UKIP have got their first local councillor in controversial circumstances, with the independent former holder of the seat threatening legal action. Six recounts apparently, and half a dozen votes in it. So quite tight then. And immensely unfortunate that it should be in one of the places where there have been allegations of electoral fraud.

It would be massively damaging to our democracy if we ended up having elections won in the courts as opposed to the ballot boxes. There needs to be no doubt in anybody's mind as to the result of an election. We were all having a little chuckle at the USA in 2001. But a similar situation now appears to be cropping up here.


As an aside, I'm a little disappointed at the BBC's coverage so far. There's no results scoreboard. Even ITV News has one of those! Instead, we have a massive obtrusive 'X'. The clunky News 24-wannabe graphics ought to be much better aswell. And when I flicked over to Sky News, they were broadcasting the returning officer of Burnley announcing results live. Why is there none of this on the BBC? The regional opt-outs are awful on News 24, and I've heard they're bad in London aswell. Just a news roundup in the middle of an election special, apparently for no reason, whilst the regions are going over results in their area. Why not keep a focus on the elections, even if there are no local elections in the area? Having the news headlines slap bang in the middle of an election results programme is just so uneasy. You really expect better. Imagine the amount of people turning over to Sky News! I'm seriously tempted you know..
UPDATE I take it all back. These results screens are quite fancy and pleasent. It's strange seeing UKIP in grey though. I'd have thought they'd actually have gone for the purple. After all, Greens are [I'd think] green, and UKIP are now a bigger party...

Well I just voted for the first time ever! And of course, the cross went next to Scottish Liberal Democrats.

The polling station was in Links Street, which is currently looking more run-down than usual, thanks to many flats being pulled down. The Philp Hall, which was the polling station, looked quite bad on the outside. You know, when some of the letters fall off the sign, yet it looks even worse when letters are upside-down. But it was very nice on the inside.

I got told by the people giving me my ballot paper that I was "only just eligible", as though I turned 18 yesterday. But I suppose if you're seventy-odd, three months does seem like 'only just'.

Dad says I didn't get the proper election experience because the pencil was long.

Keep Fallin' Hot Chip

PS. It appears that I'm the top Google result for "vote uk independence". Apologies to the person who searched for that!

Don't forget to vote - that is unless you're thinking of voting for the Swivel-Eyed Loons [as it's now apparently obligatory for bloggers to call them - and I'm all for that!].

It's just a bit of a shame that the results - for the European Elections anyway - won't be available until Sunday night.

Straw poll time. Put in the comments who you'll be voting for.. Don't be shy, even if you're voting for Loons. It'll be interesting to see how the readers of this blog would vote. [Here is the Jonblink.com election - seats would be Lib Dem 4; Greens 1; with all the rest sharing the final two seats].

[Incidentally, while we're on Jon, his blog is back. Way!]

I don't wish to be disrespectful to Ronald Reagan, an apparently popular President, so soon after his death, although it'll probably come across that way.

I'm too young to remember at all what he was like as a President. But I have this to say about the stuff currently going on in Washington.

It strikes me as odd that Americans, in general, resist public spending as much as possible. And yet [and I'm presuming this is all funded by the state; if it isn't then ignore me] they're willing to fund this rather lavish ceremony for somebody who hasn't been President for 18 years and who was on his way to death for ten years. Not to say that that would make him any less important. But really. This must be expensive. Over here, some party would end up scaring the public by telling them how much it cost in terms of hospitals.

Why bother doing away with the monarchy if you're just going to end up treating your leaders as though they're royalty anyway? I mean, it's not as if America is any worse off today as a result of Reagan's death; he was never going to be seriously influential again anyway.

I certainly can't imagine Margaret Thatcher or even the Queen getting a ceremony like this when they die. It all seems very bizarre to me..

But I think it's worth it for the new Lewis Moonie blog.

I'm actually quite proud of this. Mainly because, in a strange way, it's been my ambition to use Georgia in a design for quite a while!

At last, I managed to get my leaver's form signed. I must have had about ten 'last-day-evers', and this isn't even the last time I'll be in the school, if I'm going to be getting the yearbook. [By the way, I have insider information [not really] that the yearbook will not actually be available until after the holidays. Everybody will have forgotten about it by then!]

It was quite an odd experience all round. I had a complete stranger [the woman at the office] asking me what I was going to do next year.

Miss McCulloch, my guidance teacher, but also a Computing teacher, had the bloody cheek to assume that I was going to do Computing next year. I just said, "NO," in that sense which actually means 'are you fucking mental?'. She must have understood loud and clear, because when I explained that I was actually going to do Politics and Economics, she said, "Oh, that's much better than Computing."

I never understood why everybody in the Computing department thought I enjoyed the subject so much. Mr Mason asked me in third year if I was going to enter the programming competition. I said, "I don't really like competitions." He replied, "But you like programming."

Aye right. Have I touched programming since I ended Computing? Except for HTML and whatnot, the answer is no, because I have no interest whatsoever in making computers do pointless and stupid things in a convoluted manner.

A big V-sign up to the Computing department then, now that I've left. Although full credit to them for managing to get me a Higher B on appeal, when I got just a C in the actual exam and nothing even approaching a B throughout the entire year [to my knowledge].

NP My Favourite Things OutKast

In a way, you have to feel sorry for Scottish Wind Watch. If the top result in Google is my blog, things really can't be going well. The official Scottish Wind Watch website is only 11th.

Next time, maybe they should consider getting a blog! Or even putting the name of their party as their website's title.

Yup, I'm addicted. I think. Up until this evening, I'd only been watching the late-night live programmes [because I prefer the real conversations as opposed to the most crazy half-hour of a twenty-four-hour period]. But today I watched almost all of the 10 o'clock roundup edition, and even a bit of BBLB.

And to save you from asking: Emma, Nadia, Shell, Stuart, Vanessa, Victor.

As for Kitten, I think she's probably going to look back at this in five or ten years time and be seriously embarrassed with herself. Quite childish.

May I once again recommend Respect Watch. Anybody who still thinks that Respect are nothing more than a cosy wee anti-war party had better take a glance at this site.

Especially look at their made-up visits and the Green Party's view of Respect:

Spencer Fitz-Gibbon, the [Green] party's head of media, commented this morning:

"Respect's position is that troops should immediately be withdrawn and Iraq left to its fate. This is a disgraceful, callous attitude because we know Iraq would dissolve into civil war."

Too right.

I was going to write something very similar to what Matt T wrote.

This terrible news reminds us again, as we sit typing away in the safety of our homes, the risks that foreign correspondents face just doing their jobs.

We all like to have a go at journalists every now and again. But we easily forget how much they sometimes put themselves at risk. Gardner is one of the better news reporters at the moment, in my opinion. He seems to genuinely know what he's talking about. I have my doubts about some other reporters, naming no channels. When I heard him discussing security issues a few months ago on Simon Mayo's programme on Radio Five Live, in that extended way they do on Mayo's programme, he really sounded like he knew his stuff.

Trust Tony to try and capitalise on it though.

I climbed Bishop Hill with my parents today. That's where all the gliders fly about. A fantastic walk. Very steep, but actually not too taxing. Waiting for my parents to catch up half-way [I think I spent three quarters of the time waiting on them!], the gliders circled above me, making me feel quite dizzy.

The bottom of the hill is so weird, like an alien world. It feels so remote, but you are infact very close to two villages, Kinnesswood and Scotlandwell. In a way, the views near the bottom are as spectacular as at the top. Loch Leven is visible. The plants are all very strange; the sort of weeds you see all over the place, except a lot taller. And beyond this array of plants which is so thick it feels like an alien world, there is a completely barren area. Very odd. And a burn crosses the path at one point. I got very excited about it; it was so cool.

Looking back, we think we went up the wrong way, because towards the end it got far too steep and we had to sort of improvise our way around to get to the top. In this area, there were lots of sheep, who stared at me, baa'd at each other and then toddled off elsewhere. When we got to the top, it didn't seem like the top. It obviously was, but it was very weird. It was like when you make your own levels in a video game, and you try to get all the extremes in one place. The steep hill is very flat at the top, and there are several different mini-summits on top of this in turn.

We must have spent about two and a half hours, but it felt like only one. I wish I could share the photographs, but unfortunately we don't have a digital camera yet - although we're thinking about getting one. Has anybody got any recommendations.. Something of reasonable quality and probably in the range of about £100-150?

NP 3 Twenty cLOUDDEAD

[It might be a bit late to start the Lewis Moonie blog.]

This is quite a day for these web projects. Today Bloggerheads has a new page on 'How To Run a Weblog on Behalf of Your MP'. What a top-quality page it is too.

Found via www.perfect.co.uk, although I'd have seen it at about 1000 other places if I'd been there first, just cos it's Bloggerheads.

NP Lightning Bolts And Man Hands Hymie's Basement

They Work For You.

As Dadblog [via whom I found this] says, these sites [They Work For You, Public Whip, Fax Your MP, etc etc] are always so much better than any of the guff brought out by the government.

As you can see, if my MP gets any more pixellated he would be on Crimewatch UK. Probably just as well, as he seems to have a pretty dodgy haircut in that photo!

NP Parrots Hymie's Basement

When I wrote my Blog:Vote piece last week, I mentioned about how Britain was culturally closer to Europe than the USA because of, for example, football.

Sunder Katwala has stretched this into a rather overblown column. Still, some good points in it.

NP When The Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Kerazzee (Serious Bonus Beats mix) !!!

The Scots now love the English! It's true you know. Well, more than they did anyway. 30% will be supporting England in Euro 2004, whilst just 20% wanted England to lose against Iceland.

The survey showed many Scots were put off by the thuggish element among England fans and over-the-top match commentators.

There was also frustration over the hype that follows England wins on the TV and in newspapers, with one in three complaining.

NP The Use Of Unacceptable Colors In Nature (Mogwai remix) Boom Bip

Now Alistair Darling is saying that 'all postal voting' could be in place for the next elections for the Scottish Parliament. I hope not.

NP Third Stream (Four Tet remix) Boom Bip

I almost gave up, but I got it in the end.

I heard of this through Nick, and you can read his clues if you want [because if I didn't read them I probably wouldn't have got it].

NP Morning And A Day Boom Bip

Via Harry's Place, the Telegraph reports:

[Network Rail], which is subsidised by the taxpayer and is responsible for Britain's tracks, signals and stations, said it had given its five executive directors bonuses equivalent to 24 per cent of their basic salaries. This was despite almost one in five trains running late [and] despite announcing that they had failed to meet any targets for train punctuality and had made an annual loss of £1.1 billion.

NP First Walk (Peel Session) Boom Bip

Yuh. Well the title of this post just made me an enemy of the state. That's what freedom of speech is all about. Well, like Will, who pointed this out, some of this seems a little bit fishy. And yet, not too far-fetched either.

NP Last Walk Around Mirror Lake (Boards Of Canada remix) Boom Bip

Yup, it's one of those games which you play obsessively for about two days and then forget about completely. I played the Premiership version, but didn't carry on beyond about two months. The Euro 2004 version should be a bit less arduous though, so despite having quite a poor knowledge of football, I'm having a go.. I prefer watching the European Championships to domestic football anyway.

For those interested, here are my tentative predictions for the first round of matches.

Portugal	2 - 1	Greece
Spain	2 - 0	Russia
Switzerland	0 - 2	Croatia
France	2 - 2	England
Denmark	1 - 2	Italy
Sweden	2 - 0	Bulgaria
Czech Republic	3 - 0	Latvia
Germany	1 - 1	Netherlands

NP The Blue Room BBC Radio 1

Just giving a heads-up of some good blogging going on this evening. I can't be bothered blogging myself this evening - and it's NOTHING TO DO with drink, oh no.

Kilroy goes bananas according to Will Howells - as if we hadn't already noticed
Lots on Anthony Wells' blog. Read the past few posts, very interesting.
Finally, let's take a moment to LAUGH at Respect. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

After I criticised him in the comments box to my post below for not explaining why I should be voting Labour, Coucillor Bob Piper's gone and done it on his blog!

I'll still be voting Lib Dem though. I don't think Bob quite got my point when I was criticising Labour for being a mish-mash of different principles. Well, he probably did. But anyway, I'm thinking specifically about Europe here. I'm in favour of the EU and the Liberal Democrats seem to be the only party where I could be sure that I would be casting a pro-Europe vote. There are many pro-Europeans in Labour, but there also seem to be many Eurosceptics. Due to the horrendous voting system, I have no control over whether the person I elect is pro- or anti-Europe.

I appreciate that Bob is probably concentrating on the local elections. This is entirely understandable, as he's got to campaign for it. But there are no local elections in my neck of the woods. [I could talk about the perception of our last Labour councillor, but I don't know enough about him, as I don't really follow local politics so closely, so I'd better not. Ask if you want to know.]

Bob also seems make the point that a Labour vote is a vote for socialism. This is fair enough. A lot of people criticise 'new' Labour for abandoning their socialist principles, so I'd bet that Labour lose a lot of socialist votes. Myself, I'm never too sure about the term 'socialist'. Its definition appears to be very blurred. To take one example, a lot of people see socialism as the opposite of fascism, and yet the fascist BNP has socialist economic policies.

Whether I think of myself as a socialist depends on how you ask. For instance, if an American were to ask me if I was a socialist, I'd say yes, because an American's idea of socialism is probably sharing a double bed or something. If somebody in Britain were to ask me though, I'd say I was socialist if I wanted the current government to concentrate less on the free market. I'd say I was a capitalist if I was on the other side of the government. But I mean, surely most people are in favour of a mixed economy? I don't think many people advocate complete socialism [whatever that is these days], and certainly there aren't many people who advocate all-out capitalism.

So am I a socialist? I really don't know. I guess I'd like the current Labour government to be a bit less 'right-wing' than it is at the moment. But I'd never vote for a party on the basis that it was 'socialist'.

NP Shit Scheisse Merde Pt 1 !!!

I used to prefer the more conventional chk chk chk as the pronounciation for the band !!!. But pow pow pow has a bit more bite; suits the band's style more.

Some CDs plopped through the letterbox yesterday, although I didn't get round to blogging about it yesterday.

One of them - the only which I've listened to in full so far - is Hymie's Basement, which I discovered almost by accident whilst browsing around Bleep. Boy, am I so glad I did! I must have listened to this album about ten times already; it's great! A bit like a cross between cLOUDDEAD and Eels, or somebody else like that. Quite indie-schmindie in that sugary and melancholic kinda way.

You may have guessed from the first paragraph, one of the others is the new album from !!! - Louden Up Now. Nice for there to be a 'limited edition' second CD, although I've not got round to listening to that yet. The proper album itself is a little bit of a disappointment; most of it isn't as good as last year's superb single, Me And Giuliani Down By The School Yard (A True Story). Still, I didn't really like that at first either, so it'll probably grow on me. Nice freebies from Warpmart this time - a Louden Up Now postcard, a sticker and one of those little punky badges. I don't think I've ever had one of those little punky badges before. Nice one.

Another was Boom Bip's Corymb compilation, made up of last year's From Left To Right EP, with some new remixes and Peel Session tracks. Finally, Hot Chip's Coming On Strong. That really is a bit of an experimental purchase; I don't quite know what to expect. I'm thinking it'll be sort of 6 Music-type stuff, except with keyboards.

A day after two Lex releases landed on the doormat then, Warpmart have decided to start a Lex sale. I've got all but one of those CDs! Grrrr. I suppose that's what you get for being seriously on tha pulse, huh?

This is going to be one of those periods though, I feel.. the Team Shadetek album is on preorder now - with free postage! - and a 'rare' !!! album aswell.. How can I afford to miss those? Gah..

NP When The Going Gets Tough The Tough Get Karazzee !!!

Once again, Daniel Brett has a couple of good posts. This time the two are linked - both times the people in question are making incorrect comparisons with World War II and Nazis.

The first one is in the linklog, but I'll link it here aswell - it's about UKIP.

The second one is the comparison George W Bush made. Apparently, he thinks that WW2 began with Pearl Harbour. Here's what he said:

Like the Second World War, our present conflict began with a ruthless surprise attack on the United States.

That guy runs the most powerful country in the world, by the way..

NP Parrots Hymie's Basement

I didn't get round to writing about why I'm not voting for any of the other parties yet. This is because

1. I can't be arsed writing them
2. You can't be arsed reading them

So here's just a quickie roundup of the parties I never covered.

Labour
What do they stand for again? ..Can't remember. The party's too much of a mish-mash of different principles and policies. A Labour vote could be any of the following: pro-war, anti-war, for tuition fees, against tuition fees, pro-Europe, anti-Europe, not-too-sure-about-Europe, socialist, third wayist, pro-ID cards, anti-ID cards, Blairite, Brownite, Bennite, Evil Galloway, etc, etc. Etcetcetc. Etc. Do you see?

Conservative
I'm not a Eurosceptic.

Greens
I'm not a Eurosceptic.

British National Party
I'm not a fascist.

Operation Christian Vote
I'm not a Christian.


All of which makes the scores on the doors Lib Dems - 1; you - 0.

NP Moonhead Hymie's Basement

I had my last school exam ever today. But never mind about that. Whilst everybody else is celebrating their new 'freedom', I've just been informed that my piano exam is now less than a fortnight away, and to make up for my shiteness I have to do an hour in the morning and an hour at night time if I want to pass Grade 6. Still my mock exam was 97/150, and you only need 100 to pass. He was marking harshly as ever, but I had an extraordinarily good Sight Reading test, which I just cannot rely on having on the day. If I had a bad one, I could have been looking at as little as 90/150. And going on form, I failed Grade 4 and took two attempts to pass Grade 5. It doesn't look very promising really..

As for Media Studies, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Section 1 was easy enough; Section 2 was not so. I was writing non-stop for about twenty minutes and then I completely ran dry, and ended up rambling pretty much until the end of the exam. Ho hum.

It was my last exam, but I couldn't be bothered officially leaving [no pointless bureaucracy here!], so I'll just saunter in tomorrow to do it.

It appears as though I have a lot of work still ahead of me for the piano exam. But I feel really drained from that mock exam. So if I may, I will, for this evening, sit back and yawn alot.

NP 1/2 Brian Eno

Oh yes. Postal-only voting. What a great idea that's turned out to be. Whilst I think that the option should be open for those who want to vote by post, I see several problems with this postal voting malarkey. It's way too complicated. It's not quite so private as normal voting. Infact it is a requirement to get somebody else's signature [leaving out Mister Nofriends this time round; sorry mate]. Another thing is that people voting by post have to vote on a different date from everybody else. All sorts of stuff could happen between this date and June 10th which would make people change their minds..

Also, strange EU voting rules mean that parties can call themselves any old nonsense they want [so long as it's not blah-de-blah]. See this list-o-candidates (PDF), via Harry's Place. Conservatives - Putting Britain First. That's much more like it. The [continuity] Liberal Party have managed to put a web address for their name! Labour now have the rather uninspiring name of The Labour Party Candidates. Meanwhile, The George Galloway Party have managed to get themselves associated with the word Respect.

UPDATE Take a read of this on postal voting on Maggie Thatcher's Underpants.

It appears to be the topic of the moment. British Spin has an interesting post on the matter.

These elections are about Britishness. They're being played out against a background of a debate about what it is to be British and the argument is all coming from the right.

Very interesting. That does seem to be they way it's all playing out, actually. I suppose it's been like that since the very start though; if you look at the manifestos of the three major parties they all prominently feature the Union Jack. The SNP's manifesto wants you to "Vote For Scotland".

Regarding the discussion still going on in the comments of the post below, I thought I'd just add, for the record, in case anybody didn't know, that I couldn't give two hoots about my nationality [yes, in that hippy I'm-a-person-of-the-world sense]. Although when I'm filling in forms I say I'm British. Notice SNP voters: This does not make me English.

NP Soft Ocean Extract Team Doyobi

This is partly in response to Collie on the Disko.co.uk messageboard, and partly in response to the goings-on on Chris Lightfoot's blog. Here's what Collie said.

I've always considered myself English, but proud also to say 'Brit'. But as I've grown older, seen a little more of the world and seen how those 'Brits' outside of England actually don't like being part of Britain and want their own independance for whatever reason, I'm more and more 'English' first and foremost. And why not? You can be proud to be Scottish, you can be proud to be Welsh, but being proud to be English is something that's lacking. Which ain't right.

And I have to say that I agree with him. It's always confused me that the UK seems to be split up into 'the nations' (Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland) and then 'the regions', which is basically England all chopped up.

It also confused me how, whenever a Scottish or a Welsh person displays pride for their country it's accepted - even loved. And yet when an English person does the same thing, he gets called a racist.

Chris Lightfoot, in his summary of the European Election candidates, described the English Democrats Party as "some sort of quasi-fascist mob". Looking at the English Democrats' website, their principles and objectives are, by and large, very similar to the sort of thing that's been proposed by parties like the SNP and Plaid Cymru. Labour and the Liberal Democrats even. The difference is that, instead of being applied to Scotland or Wales, it applies to England. Another difference is that the EDP doesn't appear to be calling for complete English independence, only for devolution.

I came to the conclusion that the sort of patriotism which is commonplace in Scotland is not so easily accepted in England because it is such a big and diverse place. Different regions throughout England, I'm sure, will have their own history and culture. The case for devolution in Scotland was also made easier due to the fact that, for example, Scotland has a separate legal system and education system. I don't know though. I'm sure there's a lot more that unites me with people 5000 miles away than there is that unites me with some isolated fishing community maybe 50 miles away.

I am in favour of devolution, because I believe that local issues should be kept for local people. For a start, it would be an end to the West Lothian Question. And that doesn't stop within Scotland. I think that there should be devolution everywhere. Where I differ with the EDP is that I don't think that the devolved area should be the whole of England. It just doesn't seem local enough to me. Instead, I support the conventional boundaries which have already been drawn up.

I realise, though, that Chris Lightfoot wasn't just referring to the fact that the EDP are in favour of devolution, as he cited immigration policy, amongst others, as reasons for describing them as "quasi-fascist".

Having spent a bit of time on their website, I would say myself that they go pretty close to the bone. They seem to share a lot of traits with parties which are known as 'far-right'. Calling them quasi-fascist was perhaps not appropriate. But threatening legal action certainly wasn't.

[To be fair to Chris, he doesn't seem too keen on the Scottish Parliament or the Welsh Assembly either, and therefore isn't too much of a hypocrite - although I've never seen him call the SNP or Plaid Cymru quasi-fascist.]

Well, we all knew this one, but who could resist putting it up in black and white [or red, blue and white]?

Found via [random acts of alex].

NP Between Zudo

I'd put this in the linklog, but I just cannot recommend this post enough. It's Daniel Brett, comparing Islamic extremism with white extremism. Here's the best paragraph, but read it all.

If the government's "intelligence" (something that has shown to be lacking in respect of Iraq) is to be believed, then Islamist sympathisers make up a under 1 per cent of the Muslim population. This compares with 4 per cent support for the white extremists of the British National Party in recent opinion polls in London. This means that between 150,000 and 250,000 Londoners are sympathetic to a party whose Islamaphobic leaders have been imprisoned for terrorising and intimidating ethnic minorities.

NP Undersound Fog(Bin)

Well, I've always had a sleeping problem. Even when I was very small, I didn't fall asleep until very late. I am naturally an owl; one of those people who could quite happily stay awake until 3 or 4am and sleep on until about midday. Mornings, I always found overrated. Unless it's really early, like 5 or 6, I just don't like them. There are too many things going on at 8 or 9 o'clock for me to find it a pleasent way to wake up. I don't even like to eat breakfast until I've been up for an hour or even more, so school mornings are just hellish.

By the same token, I love staying up really late because it's a nice private time. A chance for me to do my own things at my own pace. I could spend hours on the internet, or listen to the radio all night and nobody could criticise me. I'd probably learn a good few things aswell. If I stayed up late enough, I could go out for a walk at dawn, which is one of the most amazing things I've ever done. So quiet, and yet light. A special time of the day. You could be out for hours and all you'd see is some bakery vans.

But even when I'm not doing anything, I end up staying up late. This can lead to big sleeping pattern problems. Often, I'll be staying up so late every day - and yet getting the same 8 or 9 hours' worth of sleep - that I end up just moving all the way round the clock and skipping a day in the end. Once on a weekend - during a school term - I was asleep for 14 hours! I didn't wake up until 4pm. These are extreme examples though.

The past few days I've been sleeping for ten hours a night. This is not unusual for a weekend or the start of the holidays, but I've been on study leave for over two weeks now. I shouldn't be tired. I shouldn't need to sleep for ten hours every night. It probably wasn't helped by me accidentally making coffee when I meant to make tea at about midnight. I ended up staying awake until after 4am recently. Last night I slept from just after 3am until it was almost 1 o'clock. I couldn't get up until it was about 1:15. I asked everybody to wake me up at 11, I even set my alarm. But I felt so awful. I still feel awful. I had one of those mornings when you just keep on waking up, but still fall asleep almost immediately every time. Once time half of my head felt completely numb; it was really weird and quite scary, yet I still managed to fall asleep.

So the end result is that I've actually given myself a bit of a job to do if I'm to get up feeling good for tomorrow's 'late' 1pm Media exam. I'm still feeling way to tired. I have a bit of a headache. And to top it all off it's a bloody miserable day. I've got to revise for the Media exam tomorrow [but who on earth cares about that anymore?] and a piano exam sometime this month.

But I'll go and have breakfast now, and clean my glasses [they've been way to dirty for about a week now; cleaning them will probably cheer me up]. :)