Bright Ambassador's Googlewhack non adventure

I've found out, via the extremely hand and incredibly informative, Statcounter that I've very nearly been Googlewhacked. Some bod from Channel 4 put 'Tits McCrikey' into Google and found this blog. Unfortunately 'Tit's McCrikey' returns two results. Although the other result only returns 'McCrikey'. So it's kind of a Googlewhacking victory for me. If I or you were bothered about such fripperies of course...

In other news, I'm thinking of taking up the ukulele, anyone know where I can buy a cheap but decent one from? Thought not...

And as it's the weekend, have this on me.

Ugh, I feel sick

I was unfortunate enough to catch the last fifteen minutes of that National Television Awards thingy last night. I'd never seen it before as anything voted on by the public usually ends up being shit. It didn't disappoint as Simon fucking Cowell was given some kind of Lifetime Achievement award (pointedly not voted for by the public). How can a man who, according to Mark Radcliffe, has been responsible for more shit records than anyone else, find himself winning a big TV award like that? I must be getting old.

To make matters worse, the man responsible for the second most shit amount of records, Pete Waterman, likened his shows to a Shakespeare play. Christ on a bike!

And if that wasn't enough, Piers Morgan was spraffing off about how he'd told Gordon Brown (Did you hear the clang when the name 'Gordon Brown' dropped there?) that he could take some lessons off Cowell. As if Brown hasn't got enough problems without that smarmy bastard telling him where he's going wrong and saying he should be more like the Botoxed, is-he-or-isn't-he shit magnet that is Simon Cowell.

I'm pretty sure that throughout it all, Cowell was sat there with the biggest erection he's ever had.

I'm off for a lie down.

Next year, why not give it to someone who actually deserves it. Like, off the top of my head, Tony Hart. Or the Australian 'video journalist' off my local news programme. He's ace.

Oh, and 'who's going to be the next doctor'? I don't give a fuck!

Licence to be bored

I gather there's a new James Bond film coming out. Not that you'd notice, I mean I've hardly seen any promotion done for it, have you?
I can't take Bond films seriously these days. After the first Austin Powers film it just all seem so ridiculous. But I guess that ridiculousness is the point. I was listening to Adam and Joe the other week and they had Roger Moore on. They asked him why he never seemed to take Bond seriously, he told them that how can you take it seriously, when this man, who is supposed to be a spy, is recognised in bars and casinos all over the world. And, if he doesn't want to be recognised, why does he drive around in Aston Martin DB5s and Lotus Esprits? When I see either of those cars, while I'm out and about, I always stop and say 'Cor, look at that penis extension'*.
I used to like Bond films when I was a biscuit-cruncher. My little Holy Trinity of Bonds was Goldfinger, Thunderball and You Only Live Twice. Let us, for example look at You Only Live Twice in more detail. For a start it involves a plot that sees an extinct volcano in Japan being used to launch rockets to swallow up other spacecraft. This engineering job to hollow out the volcano must have been massive. But it wasn't just hollowed out, it was also rigged up with all the gubbins needed to launch rockets, as well as a fucking monorail. And how come nobody noticed the lake in the volcano's crater was being replaced by a sliding glass cover to look like a lake? Who are all these contractors who do theses huge jobs for SPECTRE but don't tell anyone? If it was McAlpine's or Wimpey's they'd be crowing from the rooftops about this massive job they'd done in Japan. And what of planning permission? If that was in Blighty a big job like that would more than likely go to a public inquiry.
And why does he always avert some major catastrophe with 007 seconds to spare? Why can he never avert a catastrophe with a tidy fortnight to spare?
Why do we now have this new, serious Bond for the 21st century? I'm sorry, but you can't churn out twenty odd films over forty years - making huge wedges of cash - and then suddenly say 'Hmm, they were a bit silly, weren't they? This is how we think it really should be'.

Oh, and this Bond-related new release is absolutely bloody shocking.

Of course, this post has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I was listening to this week's Armstrong and Miller Timeghost podcast on my walk to work today. I'm sure passers-by thought I was a bit doolally when I cracked out laughing as they were thinking up names for new Bond girls. Tits McCrikey and Flouncy Minge indeed!


*I'd just like to point out to any ladies who might be looking in that I drive one of those very small Smart cars, if you catch my drift..........

Brand awareness

I just thought I'd have my two pence worth on this Jonathan Ross/Russell Brand thing. Isn't it funny how 'over 10,000 people have now complained'? They mean 10,000 people have now complained since reading about it in the Mail on Sunday and have probably never even heard the broadcast. Indeed, by the time they'd have read about it, this week's broadcast would have superseded last week's on podcast or online.

Not that I'm condoning what they did. If I went to work, rang people and left smutty remarks on their answerphone, I'd be severely reprimanded, and quite rightly so. I think these two should be made an example of. Are they both such powerful figures within the BBC that they'll be allowed to get away with this? I mean, who's going to miss Brand's Saturday night show? His audience should be out of a Saturday night anyway. There was some Brand fan bleating on the radio this afternoon that 'controlling comedy is wrong and if you don't like Brand then don't listen to him'. Yeah, well, making salacious remarks about someone's granddaughter when they haven't got a chance to answer back is also wrong. Tosser.

Anyway, in further news, I've started walking to work. I've put my bike away as I don't like riding in the dark. Walking's murder on my ankles. What I have noticed whilst walking is that one of my neighbours is the proud owner of an Aston Martin, and that one of the houses en route has changed its name from the original Buena Vista (it's etched on the brick gate posts) to Orchard House; Buena Vista is Spanish for 'pleasant view' apparently. They probably changed its name because the view now is of the factory where I work, a factory which makes cream cakes for every supermarket going, the largest distribution centre in the UK and the largest sugar processing works in Western Europe. Not a very 'buena' view these days, clearly.

Number Six

I've been tagged by Mr Avenues and Alleyways to do this writing six random things about yourself thingy. I'm not tagging anyone else because I don't know six other bloggers well enough, and I can't be arsed. Anyway, here goes:

1. I once saw Motorhead's Philthy Animal Taylor walking around the town in Newark of a weekday lunchtime. I knew it was definitely him because he's fairly unmistakable, right? It was during his second stint in the band in the very early 90s. As I was too shy to approach him, it was like a scene out of a cartoon, he'd stop to look in a shop window, so I'd stop twenty yards behind him to look in another shop. I often wondered what he was doing in Newark of a weekday lunchtime. I later found out that he's from Chesterfield, and while that's not exactly round the corner, it's close enough for him to feasibly have family in the town.


2. I didn't realise how bad my baldness was getting until I saw a reflection of the back of my head in some restaurant toilets last weekend.


3. I've never seen any Star Wars, Godfather, Sylvester Stallone or Lord of the Rings film. Nor do I have the desire to.


4. I once went on a protest over the visit of General Jaruzelski of Poland to Newark, when he was still the Communist leader of the country. Well, when I say protest, I mean I went and stood with some protesters outside Newark cemetery gates - which was across the road from my house - in the hope of getting on the Six O'Clock News. I didn't get on the news but the report did, I was stood behind the camera during the melee as his motorcade passed us on the way to the Polish war graves (and, more importantly, the grave of General Sikorsky, leader of the free Poles during WWII) in the cemetery. I read in the paper the other week that he's currently under trial in Poland for imposing martial law in 1981. Our house got on telly though.


5. I've been a best man twice. I haven't spoken to the first guy I was best man for in about five years. I haven't spoken to the second guy I was best man for in the last twelve months. I know this because it was his birthday recently and the last time I spoke to him was on his birthday last year. Kind of sad really...


6. The first CD I ever played on my first ever CD player was the Pet Shop Boys' Introspective on my 18th birthday. The second was Marillion's The Thieving Magpie. See, I've always had a weird taste in music. I think I played the PSBs first because Left to My Own Devices probably demonstrated the superior sound quality of the source material better (it had strings on it). Or something equally as wanky.

Celebrity lookalikes no.3

Knocked-up-in-an-afternoon, friend of Dum Dum, Hanna Barbera kiddies' post-school favourite, Touche Turtle.

Peace sign-waving, autograph shy, second least talented member of The Beatles, Ringo Starr.


I know this Ringo Starr business is last week's news, but I've never understood the fascination for autographs. What is the attraction? Is it because someone who does a job you like has actually held something in their hands and scribbled on it with a piece of paper? I dunno...
I'd rather shake someone's hand and tell them how much I like what they do. I think they'd appreciate that a lot more. I don't have anything autographed, apart from the Alex James book, which I picked up from one of those table displays in an Edinburgh bookshop with the intention of using it to read on the bog (I'm not even much of a Blur fan, I'd read any old crap about popular music. And it was on offer.). I didn't know it was signed until I got it home, and I certainly wouldn't have paid more for it just because he'd sat and signed a huge pile of them at the end of an in-store. I once read where Rowan Atkinson told autograph hunters to 'fuck off', which sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Fortunately for my mother though, he didn't tell her to 'fuck off' when she asked him about five years ago.

I'd tell this rancid old hag to 'fuck off' though if I'd just paid over £100 for the 'pleasure' of attending one of her enormodome concerts and she picked me out like that. It's not that bloke's fault her husband's sodded off, is it? And why does she use the 'f' word as punctuation? The more you use it, the less impact it has.

Leicester squares

Look at that picture. That's right, it clearly shows a wedge of lime in a pint of Coke. What sort of madness of poncification is that? I went to the De Montfort Hall in Leicester last night for the first time since I saw The Wonder Stuff there in 1989 and look what's happened. I blame the 6Music Brigade with their fancy Dan ways to be honest. Lime in Coke, whatever next......?

Anyway, the gig? Superb thanks. Elbow really are tremendous and I urge any lovers of quality music to catch them, very uplifting. I'm so, so jealous of anyone who can express themselves artistically, unfortunately I can't.

Best moment of the night? Elbow frontman Guy Garvey telling a woman in the crowd called Karen that the guy she was with called Paul had something to ask her in the next song. After the song we learned that Karen had said 'yes', hurrah! Things came back to Earth with a bump when Garvey told them that 'we won't be playing the wedding.....but to celebrate the engagement, here's a song about blinding heartache.'

Two things I've never seen at rock show too: 1) a lady roadie and 2) a cellist desperately trying to do a big rock 'n' roll finish. Top drawer. And can people please stop talking all the way through gigs please. I turned to my gig-going chum once at the end of a song to say 'Fuck yeah'. That's all that's required, thank you.

And I'd forgotten how much I love, and I mean love Newborn. Beautiful.