It’s the weekend. Thank generic chocolate honeycomb. Or not, it rots yer teef.

Week 3 of Publishers’ Rep’s Office Manager was very nice. I visited a branch of my old bookshop chain and chipped in with the selling points on stuff we wanted the depressed buyer to buy. Depressed buyers don’t like buying stuff though. I resisted tidying the shop and nobody said “do you work here?” to me, which was nice. And I was wearing a suit so I felt immortal. Or was it immoral?

While oot and aboot I bumped into Superfriend in Forbidden Planet and he produced a care package of cake from the sorely-missed local bookshop area sandwich shop. God I miss that cake, the new local sandwich shop is a health catastrophe waiting to happen so I mostly make my own or buy strage baked ogods from Spar. Arrr…

My other adventures included going to my first meeting, in my suit, with a publishing company. Sitting staring at different book jacket designs and picking them apart was nice, as was knowing what I was talking about and dealing with grownups. They were v v posh as the place was in Fancy Fancy Chelsea. There’s a chav exclusion zone around the place, apparently.

I wish there was one on my local bus route as it is infested by Stella-drinking can-chucking morons who love to listen to loud cacoponies of shite with their “bitches.” The men are bitches too, I am not a seximsist. Today’s bus stop characters included Grinning Pissed Smoking Rollups Man, Scary Feist Old Lady and Stroppy screamy Children Woman. I love them all.

New issue of Buffy Season Eight is out.

As is new issue of Captain Britain & MI13. Both are smashing good fun.

The new Torchwood season/story’s name has been revealed. I could tell you…

… but here’s a plastic Captain Spike From Buffy John instead.*

I am excited about this:

The True Blood pilot has been slightly tweaked and here is a new trailer.

Phil from Worapalava is quite right about Solange. But how do I say her name? MP3 here. I like it.

Heroes is almost back in a new trailer …

… and it’s going to be shown on BBC2 close to the US transmission dates. How considerate!

In other news, Ben and Darrell have been exploring an arse in their new Roadshow Week video extravagamza at TATP. So go there. Please.

*It’s called Children Of Earth.

I could waffle on about trying to erect a bookmarks spinner without all the necessary parts to stop the pole going straight through the hole, or weird reality/Hollyoaks badly-written and acted (is there any other type?) crossovers, weird badly acted (but fun) Hollyoaks/Eastenders villainous character crossovers (coming this Friday to a telly near you), or puny humans geting on already-full tube trains and holding everyone else up while they try not to get squished by the doors, or being asked “do you have any Trollope?” by a customer and trying not to be amusing… but instead it’ll have to be a quirky electro thumpy thumpy synthy colourful funtime alert!

Not that I mind, but it looks like Smiley Kylie has wandered into Robyn’s videos when making the clip for In My Arms.

Freaky a little bit masculine blond hairstyle? Check!
Performing in little boxes? Check!
Odd little sped-up bits? Check!
Peculiar eye make up? Check!
Quirky little outfit that looks like it doesn’t quite fit? Check!

I find it odd yet good this as a single now as it’s the oldest track on the X album, having been in the first batch of leaks. Old yet new, like Robyn’s recent songs too. Hmmm… but it’s not The New Single for us Brits. Yet. That honour goes to the other very good dance track, Wow. That’s its title, not just me being sarcastic about it.

And while I remember, here’s an mp3 of that new Gnarls Barkley song that I liked yesterday and went on about a bit…. courtesy of that fine blog Missionfreak. It has noisy children, a Scooby Doo style cartoony running noise and repetitive beats, so who wouldn’t like that?

A grumpy person, that’s who.

My health is all odd this week: Nosebleeds, broken sleep patterns and more poos than normal. I have no idea what it means though as I am not a doctor. But I know someone who knows a man who is…

The Sarah Jane Adventures has been recomissioned. Of course it has, it’s fantastic. The marvellous Lis Sladen herself told SFX “Yes, we’re doing 24 episodes… I think we start end of March.” Geeks everywhere rejoiced.

Wednesday was Muslims, yesterday was Poles, so what’s it to be today?

Romanians! Well it is Nasty Foreigners Week at The Express after all. Do they mean this lot?

I hope that’s just the stitching of her hotpants and not, well, you know.

(Purchased) Album Of The Week: Lightspeed Champion or Cat Power? Or The Eels? They’re all special double disc editions of course, I need to listen to them again and decide but I like them all. Don’t make me choose! I may know by tomorrow, when I’ll have time to waffle (mmmm waffles) a bit about each one.

Those new Kylie remixes are leaking all over the place like an incontinent person whose urine is made of glitterballs. Which sounds painful. The Wow (click here) ones are a mixed bag and the In My Arms (click here) ones are a bit too trendy for an old git like me.

I really must watch the latest Torchwood, Jpod, Nip/Tuck, Pop On Trial and Hollyoaks, plus that Breaking Bad thing that looks highly bloggable. Maybe tomorrow, with some ironing. Such glamour.

Mmmmmm… lovely cheese and chive crusty bap from Waitrose. I live the life of luxury, minus da bling. Innit. Now where was I? Oh yes. I went outside to buy stuff and it was rather predictable. We had to repeatedly beep, hand gesture and bang on the window (ours, not hers, obviously) at a lovely local lady who decided to attempt to pull out of the road we were turning into while her car was a good 25% on our side of the road. The poor thing had no idea why we were upset as she was taking a very important call on her mobile phone. ‘Puny’ has been upgraded to ‘useless fucking’ humans today. But at least we came back in one piece and now have a new cheese grater (which terrifies me for some reason) and lots of scrumptiousness to eat. But not tonight as we have a rare evening out. With food and company, whatever next?

Next? The Express of course, which caused titters when browsing it in the supermarket:

Now I love a quiz as much as the next geek but a whole quiz on Madeleine? Where’s the fun in that? At least have a music round, damnit.

Memo to world: The new Goldfrapp single (mp3 here) should never ever be remixed. Ever. It’s musical blasphemy!

Music 2008 continues…

… and it’s Alphabeat’s turn. I may have mentioned them before…

Fascination now has an appropriate video. Hurrah. They have a UK record deal and the album is coiming… eventually.

In other news. Those Scouts (lead by Peter ‘Blue Peter’ Duncan) have got some new badges as it was about time. Healthy eating, Imagination, Safety and Health and fitness are among the new ones, which sounds like a good idea. I remember the days when I was rather proud of my Tea-making badge and I stil use those skills about twenty times a day. I am not a tea lady though…

Daily Mail readers surprisingly did not like this turn of events. Teaching kids about keeping healthy through choosing the correct food and activities must be political correctness gone mad, right?

“Lord Baden-Powell must be spinning in his grave!” – Pat, Lanark

“Sickening. Social engineering gone criminal.”- Camille, USA

“I’m surprised they don’t have a badge for hairdressing.” – Alexander Macintyre, Yorkshire

“The liberal lefties got their hands on the movement in the mid 60s and destroyed all that had made it appealing to boys. They destroyed its traditions, its ethos, its pride inlooking smart in public and its camaraderie. Now it is nothing more than a youth club in uniform.Pathetic.” – John, Witney UK

Puny humans.

Ouch. I have a bedroom injury and a bit of the lurgey cough is still lurking but nevermind because …

The Project76 Book Club is back!

That man from Eels who actually IS Eels aka E aka Mark Oliver Everett has a book out, as well as forthcoming Singles and B-Sides collections. How busy is he? It’s published around about now (well it’s in my bookshop anyway) and is probably rather good. I’ve not had time to read it yet but unlike most ‘celebrity’ autobiographies he actually wrote it and actually has some interesting life experiences to write about. It might be a bit depressing though… Here’s an mp3 which happens to share its title with tha book in question: Things The Grandchildren Should Know.

Music 2008 is also back!

Hmmm… I quite like Lightspeed Champion and he’s another of my Music 2008 acts. After watching the video for Tell Me What It’s Worth (where he runs around Picadilly Circus with a cape on and the touristy sights give him messages I googlied him and found some clips of him with That Patrick Wolf. Oh what a surprise. Why not have a listen to it with this free mp3 I found lurking around the internet?

The album’s out in a few weeks and if you want a new male singer songwriter who is not the boring usual kind of whiney guitary sap then you could do a lot worse than Lightspeed Champion. It’s not his real name though, which disappointed me, but it comes from the comic stip that Devonte (aka the man himself) did at school. Well that’s what Wikipedia says and we all know how that site is as reliable as The Daily Mail. Which leads me nicely into the next thing…

Daily Shite Watch is back as well! Someone important from Da Church suggested that there were no-go areas for non-muslims and that they were concerned for community cohesion because this prevents different faiths mixing and could increase far right groups making trouble. So the tabloids will probably make it so much better by not encouraging stereotyping, half truths and reinforcing the readers’ prejudices through shoddy journalism and use of ridiculous stock imagery. Which will not make far right groups cause more trouble and create more no-go areas for non-white people as well as white people. Of course not…

Maddie is back! Scary Picture is back! Another ‘witness’ is back… kind of. Months and months after the ‘event’ another random person says “Oh yes I believe I saw a suspicious man by that apartment. He was of average height and build, with two arms and two legs. I can haz newspaper ’story’ money now? K thanx.” Or something like that. Ghouls… and oh yes the Express has resurrected its shit-stirring Muslim headlines. At least they didn’t use The Muslim Picture (is this the new Scary Picture?) . I bet The Daily Mail did. Let’s see …

Bugger. It’s such a brilliant photograph, that one, it’s become one of the Mail’s two stock Muslim Photos for every occasion. And when I say every occasion I mean for either scaremongering or racist purposes. Of course all the muslims I know look just like the ones in The Muslim Picture and are forever doing rude gestures at anyone who’ll pay them any attention, the bloody show-offs. I wonder if the other Muslim Picture is anywhere on their site today?

Investigating…

Aha! It’s in the marvellous Mail polls section:

I had forgotten that all muslims are hardcore fundamentalist women. Thanks for reminding me, Mail. I wonder what the results of this poll will be? I bet a lot of the readers live in ‘da ghetto’ so will know a lot about this particular issue. The other poll looks interesting too, as some registrar has caused herself a kerfuffle by not wanting to perform any civil partnerships which are PART OF HER BLOODY JOB because they are “against her religious beliefs.” Even though they are part of her bloody job. Hmmm… I have so much sympathy for her, as you can imagine. What can we learn from this pair of predicaments? Religion is bad except when it’s a nice white middle class lady not wanting to do her job because her interpretation of her supernatural imaginary friend wouldn’t like it and then it’s alright? Do I dare take a look at these poll results? Can I mention how disappointed I am that the Civil Partnership one does not use The Gay Picture (i.e the one with two drag queens on a Pride march holding hands)? I have to vote to see them. OK…

Meh.

Double meh.

And this, my dear readers, is why The Daily Mail is for c**ts, in case you hadn’t worked that out yourself by living in the real world and mixing with real people. Goodbye!

Presenting the new Simple Blog Format:

The free mp3 song of the day is Cat Power doing a stonking version of Stuck Inside Of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again by Bob Dylan. From that film about those Bob Dylans. Click here, via Twelve Major Chords.

The annoying thing of the day is the mobile phone. From customers at work ignoring me while being served because they are too busy having inane chats to even acknowledge a real human being’s presence to the bad parent who was more interested in her scintilating conversation than her small child trying to fall down some stairs out of her eye-range, to the woman not slowing down at the roundabout for us because she was chatting and laughing on her phone while attempting to drive. While giving the one-fingered salute is not something I particularly enjow I think our combination of slow crawling speed round the roundabout while I gave her the finger was pretty satisfying. I bet she didn’t realise why I was annoyed though, puny lady! I hate these crappy things as they encourage the puny humans to upgrade their rudeness and inconsideration levels. And I haven’t even mentioned ringtones.

The Daily Express cover of the day is as follows:

New year, same old shit. ‘Health’ nonsense, Madeleine bollocks and girls in pants. Nice to see coverage of the 50-or so people murdered in Kenya and the ongoing Pakistan kerfuffles. Er, this is a newspaper, isn’t it?

The Music 2008 artist video of the day is from Alphabeat…

… but it’s not their new single. We’re just so behind in the UK.

The other blogger’s post of the day is Andrew Collins’ Manners Manifesto. I read it after my mobile phone rudeness rant and it seemed apt.

As I had some time off I had some time to watch some films: Hurrah! Perfume was very odd, very weird, very good. I liked the way that we didn’t really see Grenouille as evil even though he was a serial killer, or was that just me showing my lack of normal brain? Anyway, if you want something a bit different to watch and don’t mind never wanting to see a bottle of perfume ever again then I recommend Perfume. Or buy the book coz like they made a book of it like they did wiv Lord Of Da Ringz, innit? The other film I watched was Spider-Man 3 as I hadn’t bothered to go to the cinema to see the damn toy advert masquerading as a movie. It was ‘interesting’ for many reasons: Wanting Mary Jane to die as she is so whiney and always gets captured by whatever villain is in the film ; Wondering what the hell that Venom origin was all about (1950s B-Movie? Anybody?No?) ; Trying to understand the logic of the whole “whoops, we forgot to tell you that man who killed your uncle and made you be a spideryman didn’t really kill him as some other man did and now he’s made of sand” idea ; Marvelling at the utter crapness of Emo-Spidey with his James Brown funky strutting, emo fringe and jazz club chair slinging shenanigans… and so on and so on. The Curse of Film 3 strikes again!

And now… more from from Music 2000 (and seven):

From the time spent as lead singer in forgotten indie Britpop band theaudience (lower case, like kd lang) to that bloody disco-sampling song with Spiller to her admittedly slightly patchy solo albums, Sophie Ellis Bextor has been interesting, to say the least. Her last album was the first one I actually paid for as it didn’t fall into the pop album trap of singles + filler = album. I don’t think it did all that well commercially, again, which is a shame. Them gays what whoop her need to dig deeper into their pockets and cough up the funds. Mp3 here. Probably.
Catch You Video:

Me and My Imagination video:

What fun! Tomorrow: More of the same old shit, and maybe my thoughts on that Doctor Who Christmas Special. Or will “I liked it and it was the best Christmas Special yet” do?

Bleurgh! Had the busiest day of the year at the bookshop today as someting called Christmas is going on and it was a Saturday so people like to buy things. Well, we had to have appropriate music and we have done for a few weeks now, so I thought I should choose the winners of Christmas Tune 2007. And I did. I couldn’t quite decide between two songs… So…

Aimee Mann and Grant-Lee Phillips perform “You’re A Mean One, Mr. Grinch” from her rather good Christmas album.

mp3 to download and keep forever…. Here! Merry Christmas!

The Captain And Tennille are quite famous in America. Probably. Anyway, here is I Want A Hippopotamus For Christmas on mp3. Oh yes. It’s marvellously shit and has been playing in the shop for weeks now.

A day off at last. Hurrah! I’m off to a secret location for the next day or so. No, it’s not rehab.



Well… it looks nice in the ‘brochure’. I shall take some photos so we can do Show And Tell tomorrow…

Tubing into London so you’d think I would jump at the chance to do a bit of geek shopping but I’m all shopped out, what with running a shop. Probably. Oh I don’t know. As I have to visit St Pancras station, here’s a free mp3 of Kings Cross (Hot Chip Remix) by Tracey Thorn. I bought it on iTunes last night and now some blogger bugger has uploaded it for free. Curses!

Day 7 of 7 is done, I now have 3 days away from the books. Tomorrow will consist of a bit of pottering around the house then a trip to the new (oh how exciting) St Pancras station where I have to get a train to somewhere in the midlands, for the Work Christmas Do. Not my work though, it’s I.T wife duty for me. Again. But I don’t mind at all, it’s actually rather nice being an oddity. I have a fully-charged iPod and the new Doctor Who Magazine (with free poster of That Picture) to keep me entertained, but knowing my luck the cold weather will freeze the tube system and I’ll get nowhere. I am so full of Christmas cheer!

I have some of Music 200(and 7) left to do but today is a bit of Music 2000(and 8), with Adele finally getting the attention of da meedja everywhere. How unfortunate that she is being called ‘The New Amy Winehouse’ by lazy journalists. If anything, she is the new Alison Moyet and I don’t mean that in a fattist way. She’s got the range, darling.

Love that Chasing Pavements song, as I have done for quite a while now. But just how do you chase a pavement? Free mp3 here if you click. Ah go on.

Comics news: The first part of Ultimates Volume 3 is finally here! But it’s proper shite. Bad dialogue, rubbish plotting, to much tits-n-arse artwork, horrible colouring, loss of all the magic. End of review. Boo hoo.

But… yes. Suburban Glamour issue 2 is out too, and it’s much much better. Phew.