Madonna and Mr Madonna to split up

I know, I know, he's got a name. He's an esteemed director. Did I say "esteemed"? Sorry, I meant "steaming pile of shite", my bad.

Anyway, here the BBC News website promises us "the marriage's memorable moments". I wonder if it includes my favourite memorable moment: the one where Guy (see, his name is just like guy, dude, bloke) sneakily glances at his watch while Madge is trying to adopt some little African kid.

What's up, guy, things moving a little too slow for you? Got something better to do, another flop to make maybe.

Losers!

My only regret is that they should announce this just as Madge's biggest fan has had a glamorous wedding in Vegas. Big love to Candy and the Stagg Man, and congrats!

Oops, it’s Wednesday again already...

So that's a whole week passing by without a whole lot to say. I dunno. Blog lethargy has set in for a whole bunch of people, I guess, including me.

It's not that I've totally done nothing, but it's fair to say I've done nothing much (though we did meet up with some new peeps on the weekend; see here for deets). I didn't even get started on that short video project I mentioned last time. I intend to, though. Maybe today. But first I have to go shopping for a new car. Yeah... bummer.

Yesterday, Red and I looked out the window and saw it was a glorious day, so we decided not to work. That's the raddest thing about working from home. If it's a quiet week and the weather is nice, you can just skip work. We headed out to the seaside -- Broadstairs, to be precise.

We wandered the lovely streets, set foot on the sand briefly, wandered some more, went and ate a pizza at a nice little Italian restaurant, wandered some more, went and had tea and cake at a delightful little café, wandered some more, and then headed back home, stopping off for a sit down on the beach at Whitstable en route.


Once there, we plonked ourselves down, kicked off our shoes, and just sat in a shady spot watching the sea retreating from the shore. Just chillaxing, y'know?

By the time we got back home it was just after 6pm, and we found a card saying that the postman had been unable to deliver a package cos it was too big for our slot. Red said she had an idea that it might be from Captain Karen...

The rest of the early evening passed uneventfully, until the music and singing next door alerted us to a birthday in the house. Fuck. And on it went until after 1am. Tossers.

Anyways... At 8:15 this morning I headed down to the sorting office to collect the parcel, and it was from Karen!

I rushed back home, the missus grabbed the scissors, and we cut our way into our box o' goodies. And what goodies they were! Maple Leaf cream-filled cookies, saskatoon jam (look out breakfast time!), and a book called How to Be a Canadian, which may be pretty timely since we heard Canada is looking for emigrants and we might just look into that...


Thank you, lovely Captain for your lovely gifts. As ever, they are much appreciated and will be put to good use, of that you can be sure!

Well, that's all the news that's fit to print for another day, so catch you on the flipside, guys 'n' gals.

Is it Wednesday already?

It's my dad's birthday today. He's 61.

On Monday I had another two and a half hours' work done on my tattoo backpiece. It's looking so motherfucking rad now, man. I really love it. Which is a good thing, cos it would kind of be a problem now if I didn't, wouldn't it?! According to my little black book, that puts the total time spent in the chair so far at 12 hours. And unlike some tattooers, Xam tends to be working the whole of that time, rather than taking phone calls and shooting the shit with passers-by. As a client I really appreciate the difference. He reckons we'll be pretty much done in about another two sessions, or around five hours.

This week's session was the most painful yet. There were times when I was thinking I'd have to stop. I've never experienced that before. But I kept saying to myself, "If I tap out now, it's another six weeks or so until I get back here." That was enough to spur me on and endure the discomfort.

What else...?

Oh yeah, I sent Shea a copy of the short film I made (whisper it) 11 years ago, coupled with a music video from the following year, I think. It'll be interesting to hear what he thinks of them. If I ever get around to it, I might even post them up on here someday.

I've set myself a small film-making challenge for this week, too, so I hope to get that started and finished in the next couple of days.

Italy went out of the European Cup, losing to Spain on penalties. That sucked, but they didn't play so great.

If you've not been over to my movie reviews (such as they are) in recent weeks, there has been some activity there, though I confess to having been a little lax. I'm trying to get on top of that shit, cos I'm watching some good films at the moment.

I'm sure I had some other stuff to write about, but it's gone clean out of my head. Oh well, probably wasn't very important. Not as important as me getting downstairs to deal with the washing up, anyway. So, off I go.

Blogging. And Candy.

It's almost a cliche that when a blogger doesn't know what to write about, he or she will write about blogging. Well, that's not really what this post is, but it kind of is.

When I woke up this morning, I had this feeling that the bottom has fallen out of blogging, but then I thought, "No, perhaps it's just me."

When I started this, about 27 months ago, I was writing a lot. Writing often, that is, albeit often short entries, and these tended to be based on news stories.

Lots of other folks seemed to have started at about the same time. I won't link cos I'm lazy, but you all know who they are: Cappy, Four Dinners, Candy, Steve Dullard, The English Ranter. These few peeps seemed to be my first contacts in blogland, and it was great.

Over the two years that have passed, Cappy and 4D have reinvented themselves a couple of times; Steve disappeared, reappeared and disappeared again; and the English Ranter slowly wound down. I've slowed my pace and have sometimes wondered whether I can be arsed to continue.

But Candy stayed strong, educating us with both high-brow and low-brow posts, mixing pop and politics and everything in between.

Until now.

Although I've never met her, she's one of the best friends I've made on the blog circuit, and I've had some great mails and blog exchanges with her, not to mention that we send each other video care parcels on a regular basis, sharing some of the best of our respective countries' TV.

But The Gnostic World Of Candy Minx is now on hiatus. For how long, who knows? One thing is for certain: the world's a duller place without it.

Let's hope it's not dead and just sleeping. Thanks Candy.

Singing from the same hymn sheet

A few weeks ago, some e-mail discussion between my missus and Shea ended up with the idea that she would send him a recipe and he would try to cook it, documenting his efforts via the gift of video.

In the meantime, she and I decided to do the same -- partly as a visual guide for Shea in his efforts, and partly because I like shooting and editing video. Our finished vid is posted here, as regular readers will know.

But now, Shea and Avid Andy have shot their own version of the same dish. Go and check it out by clicking here, please. It's very funny and well worth a few minutes of your time.

Thanks for being such good sports, Andy and Shea, and we look forward to hearing what challenge you set for us next...

Post #795, wherein I make promises that I probably can’t keep regarding how soon I’ll hit my 800th post

Dudes -- I've been a slacker. Sorry and all that, but this week has turned into total fucking mayhem on the work front.

I really wanted to do some posts about Seville. And I will. But I had intended to chop together some video footage first, and that shit takes time. Time I don't have right now.

You wanna know how short of time I am? My tattooist called to say that I could have three hours on Friday cos someone had cancelled an appointment, but I had to turn it down cos I'm too damn busy. Believe, when I'm too busy to go and get tattooed, it means I'm FUCKING busy.

And it's some bad work that's keeping me busy. Proofreading is my least favourite of the strings to my bow. It's the being rooted to the spot for so long, so deep in concentration, keeping track of all the editorial style choices. And it pays the least well of the jobs we do, too. That said, this one is a good rate because it's a short-notice, 11th-hour kinda gig.

So, as alluded in the title, I promise to be back soon with some Seville stories before they all seem too late to write about. And some video clips. In the meantime, the missus is writing about it. But if you're really jonesing for a piece of my own words, don't forget you can always go check out my movie reviews (such as they are).

And anyway, my 800th post seems so damn insignificant now in light of Candy Minx's 1,000th. Not to mention furiousBall's 2,000th of a couple of weeks back. Pah! I'll try to get it done by Monday, though...

Post #792, wherein I pimp myself

I'm sure you're all gagging to read my answers to some questions put to me by fellow blogger Captain Karen, so click here or on the picture of the HMS Swiftsure on the right to check out the interview.

But don't forget to vote for nephew Liam again, too. Click the pic in the post below to take you to the place to go. (Ha, that rhymes! Yes, I'm an idiot.)

End-of-year round-up

Seven things from 2007

Readers of this blog will already know much of what I did or that happened in my life over the course of the past 12 months, but I just wanted to do a little précis for my own interest to make myself feel good at what can be a depressing time of year.

1. I got tattooed on no fewer than five separate occasions, totalling three completely new tattoos and finishing off one older one that had been languishing in limbo. That's more tattooing than I've ever previously had in one year.

2. I received a letter and a box of goodies from author Chuck Palahniuk, to whom I had written late in 2006. Chuck is a god and a legend, and this was a fucking rad start to a new year. It arrived the day we left for Seville, so I only had a quick look before leaving...

3. Speaking of Seville, I, along with my dearly beloved wife, travelled out of the country on five separate occasions, visiting a total of six -- count 'em! -- new cities: Seville, Granada, Còrdoba, Taormina, Catania, and Valencia. That's more travelling and more cities than I've ever done in one year.

4. The wife and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. That's some feat, my friends, in these days of constant reminders of failed romance everywhere you look. And you know: she ain't a bad chick. The years have gone quickly, and I look forward to sharing the next decade with her. And the next, and the next...

5. It was a momentous year, too, for celebrations. Between our combined families, we celebrated not only our 10th wedding anniversary, but also a new birth, a turning-teenage birthday, and birthdays for a 30th, a 40th, a 50th, a 60th, a 70th, and an 80th! AND my mum got married again. Now that is quite astonishing, I think!

6. Red and I had had our first MIRL. Milla and her man Zorro were the lucky recipients of our presence, while we were the lucky recipients of their yummy food and hospitality. MIRLing was fun. We'll do it again one of these days, I hope.

7. I spent several hours in hospital. While this is, thankfully for me, not up there with the medical horridness that several of my blogmates have been through this year (stand up, Martha, for your courage under the most trying of times), it's not something I am terribly accustomed to... and I hope never to be. Hospitals in the UK are dirty, disease-ridden hellholes. Thank fuck it was only a few hours.

So... it was a year, that's for sure. I don't know what 2008 has in store. Who does? But one thing is for sure, I can't imagine it being as full of stuff as '07.

So what's on the horizon? We have our first gig lined up for the end of January; I have my first appointment to get my tattoo backpiece started at the beginning of February; March is my birthday; April looks like a trip to Germany... Hell, maybe it will be as action-packed. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, I'd like to take a moment to wish everyone who stumbles upon my writings -- but most especially those of you who come back time and again and with whom I've developed something as close to friendship as any I have in real life -- a really great 2008. Take care out there, my friends.

Who’s the winner? I’m the winner, baby!

A couple or three weeks back, blogmate and fellow ninja Franki had a game of Guess over at this post. There was a prize on offer, and if there are two things I like, it's (a) showing what a smarty-pants I am and (b) winning stuff for showing what a smarty-pants I am.

Anyways, I looked at the pic and figured, Damn, someone musta already guessed it. But as I scrolled through the handful of comments before me, no one had got it right. I couldn't believe it. But they were common-or-garden conkers, surely to goodness? Maybe these things are not so well known in the U.S. of A., but here in the U. of K. we love that shit. We grow up on them, practically. Never a winter goes by when we don't get fucked-up knuckles from playing conkers as kids, baking them in the oven, soaking them in vinegar and thinking up myriad other ways to create a championship, beats-all-comers, hard motherfucker of a conker.

Anyways, short story long, I won. And yesterday I received my just rewards. Word to the wise, though, Franki: clearly sushi doesn't travel well, since they tasted a bit waxy. Thanks for the thought, though.
;-)

Miss Milla, nooo! We will not let you go!

So, Saturday was the big day. The day of the MIRL between me and Red, and Milla and Zorro. We threw caution to the wind when arranging our meet, and it was decided to get together not in public or on neutral ground; rather, the venue was Milla's house, which is about 42 miles (67 km) away from us. It's funny, when we lived in London, it would take us about 75 minutes to drive 12 miles across London to see friends. These days we can do 42 miles in less than an hour when traffic conditions are favourable.

We arrived at 1.15pm to be greeted by Milla walking down her front path towards us. We met at the gate. The two girls kissed and hugged hello. Then I, too, had my turn. Red and Zorro kissed hello; he and I shook hands in a manly fashion. We entered their home and went straight through into the back garden.

It was a glorious day. You could even say it was a touch too glorious: although we stood and sat in it chatting and drinking for a while, when it came to sitting down to eat, we moved to the shade. I felt bad for Zorro, who loves being in the sun, but it was just too hot for the rest of us. It was hot for Pisko the cat, too, who spent much of the time trying to cool his belly in the shade.

Milla had cooked lasagne, and Zorro barbecued a trout for each of us. With the salads and giant mushrooms and the rest of the food, there was enough for a truly long and sociable lunch. Everything was delicious, but I can't remember the last time I ate so much! There were even two tiramisus: one that we brought with us and one that Milla made!


Don't you just hate self-timer pictures?
Someone always gets cut out of the shot...

We ate and drank and chatted. We talked about work and tattoos and chavs and blogs and travel and home and family and cats and how we met our partners -- essentially, all the most important things in life. And the next thing we knew it was 8pm. Where had the day gone? We chatted some more, but knew that the evening would soon have to come to an end. About 9pm we headed to the front door for the 10-minute goodbyes. It's nice when goodbyes take a wee while; it's like you're delaying the inevitable.

It was a great day we had for our first MIRL. Within minutes we were comfortable with each other, which came as no real surprise. What was a surprise, though, was the fact that we have mutual friends/acquaintances. Milla and Zorro know some photographers that I used to work with quite regularly a few years back. That was bizarre. London is a big city, and yet it's a small world, right?

One of the strangest things was what to call one another. I think everyone was called at least two names and possibly three in some cases. When you get accustomed to someone being a certain name, it can be strange to have to change that thought process!

Thanks, guys, for a great day. Here's to the next time! I keep thinking of other things that I should add to this post. I feel like there's so much to say. But I have to stop somewhere, right. So I'll stop here. Now. End. Fin.

Weren’t he a wizard or summink?

Everyone's on about Harry Potter right now, but I want to talk about another wizard: MIRLing.

Those of you who read my wife's blog will already know that this weekend we have our first MIRL (meeting in real life) lined up. We are heading over to the home of Milla and her man Zorro.

I'm kind of not surprised that Milla should be our first. We don't live that far apart; she's Italian and has spent half her life in the UK, just like Red; she laughs at some of my bad jokes...

And it got me thinking. Milla first came to this blog while looking for posts about New Model Army. And despite a couple of lyrics that I have posted, I have done only one post about New Model Army. But she found it and left a comment. I returned the courtesy, and we've been firm blogmates ever since.

I suppose as one MIRLs more and more often (and Martha seems to be becoming quite the expert), such meetings must become less daunting. I think, though, that Martha's friends fear for her life with every one! I can only imagine what they might say when she shows them my masked mug and says she's meeting up with me!

There are several people on my blogroll who I look forward to meeting someday. But I think we men are not very MIRLy. I mean in the way of arranging such things. Perhaps it's no coincidence that MIRL rhymes with girl. I don't even know what I'm on about any more.

Anyways... tomorrow is the day. Look out, Milzor, here we come! It's gonna be cool. And I promise not to groan when you put Pink Floyd on the hi-fi. (Actually, I've got my fingers crossed. I can't make such promises, sorry...)

Ain’t mates great?

Sometime back in March it was Buy A Friend A Book week, and my blogmate Karen was kind enough to give me a gift voucher for Amazon.co.uk

At that time, shortly after my birthday, I had a few books that I had yet to get around to reading. Birthday gifts some, but also some Christmas ones. Hell, who am I kidding? I've got books from years ago that I've never got around to...

Anyway, bottom line is, I didn't want to rush out and buy the first thing that came into my head only to have it sitting there doing nothing. I wanted to pick the appropriate gift. And I wanted to pick something as close as possible to the value of the voucher, so that Karen bought me a whole book.

The book I eventually bought, just a couple of weeks ago, was Digital Film-Making by Mike Figgis, director of Leaving Las Vegas and Internal Affairs and one of the biggest proponents of DV in Hollywood.

What a book! I couldn't put it down. For about a week it felt as though I was superglued to that book. In a good way. And it's small enough to carry with you wherever you go. If you are interested in low- and no-budget film-making, this book is an essential purchase. It will now take pride of place on my bookshelf alongside that other low-budget film-making bible, Robert Rodriguez's Rebel Without A Crew.

So, thanks Karen, for buying a friend a book. Sorry it took so long for me to redeem your voucher, but I hope you know it was worth the wait!

It’s one of those things, innit?

Facebook, I mean.

Those of us who do this blogging thing seem to have a compulsion to find out about and join other Web-based thingamajigs. Those of us who grew up in an era when people had real, flesh-and-blood friends who they'd meet up with once in a while might not fully understand what all these things are for.

Facebook, MySpace, BeBo, and whatever the fuck else is out there for "social networking". I read a few months ago about one social-networking site aimed specifically at black people, and that it is devised as neighbourhoods that you aspire to or something. I forget the name now. Oh hold up, it might be The Block. Something like that, anyways.

I have a Facebook account, just as I have a YouTube account, two MySpace accounts, and several blogs. But I don't know many people on Facebook. I've been there a few weeks, but no one I know in real life has one. And my Facebook account is in my real name. I know Cappy is on there, and Shea and Adam and Martha. And Will and James K.

So... do I hook up with peeps who I know only in blogland? Or do I set up yet another online thingy with my nom de plume? Oh, I just don't know anymore. It's complicated having all these personae. I feel like a superhero. Without the super powers, obviously.

“My inspiration has run dry”

Venice: Unlike me, not dry.

What better title for a post than a Natalie Imbruglia lyric? That's right, folks, nothing is right, I am, y'know, torn and shit. Yup, I’m as dry as a nun's cunt, as we used to say back in my old hometown.

The reason for this desert-like state of bloggy being is, as it always is with me, a valanga of work. (That's your Italian lesson of the day. Valanga [literally "avalanche"] is used to mean "shitload".)

Saturday morning I started working at 6am and I finished at 8pm. In between, any breaks I had were used to eat lunch, go food shopping and to the post office, and start clearing out the kitchen.

Sunday I started work at about 8:30am, having had a bit of lie-in, and I finished at 6pm so that I could do some more work clearing the kitchen and have my dinner. I then went back to work at 11:25pm for an hour.

What's with all the kitchen clearing? Well, this week is the week we are having our new kitchen fitted. Everything is changing (except the cooker and washing machine, and I think we are beginning to regret that we didn't decide on new ones of those, too).

So for most of this week we will be without a cooker, oven, and hob, and we also won't have a kitchen sink. Red spent much of her "free time" at the weekend preparing some delicious Italian dishes that we can throw in the microwave, rather than resorting to takeaways every night.

Yes, a fun weekend was had by all. We're into equal-opportunity misery in this household. Even Cat gets a piece of the action. He has been put in a cattery for the week (we call it a spa retreat when he's nearby). This is because the last time we had workmen in (for the bathroom a couple of years ago), he got so freaked out that he legged it out through the back door and we never saw him for hours. When he finally returned he was very quiet. And at about 11pm we realized that he had cut open almost the entire length of the lower part of one of his back legs. Midnight trip to the vet. Severed the ligaments. Hit or miss whether he'd ever be able to use it again. But Doctor Jim was a fucking total genius and you'd never know now from pictures like this the extent of the original wound. We don't want to go through that shit again.

Right, it's 9am. I'd best get to work. I hope to get round to some of my blogpals and check out what y'all have been writing in recent days. Toodle-oo.

Look at my package!

How often does one get a parcel in the mail that says this on it? Come on, now, you can't tell me it's an everyday occurrence... It came from Canadaland, y'know, from Captain Karen of the Good Ship HMS Swiftsure.


There were some skull mittens for both me and the missus. Sure, cynics among you might say, "But it's summertime, Mr * (asterisk), why would you want mittens?" To that I respond: "Yeah, but we have English summers in England. Of course I'll need mittens!" And they are damn toasty as well as tasty, Cap'n. And don't you think they look great on me doing my Raging Bull Skull impression?

But there were other goodies, too -- too many to show here, including chocolate-covered cocoa beans, a copy of Dostoevsky's Crime & Punishment, toys for Cat, and a typically Canadian fridge magnet (right). I have it on good authority that every home in Canada has at least one of these on their refrigerator. And they sit down on their kitchen stool staring at it lovingly while listening to the government-issued CDs (below) compiled by Karen for the purposes of mind control.



Thank you, Karen, for such a wonderful parcel. Big love to you. With our colour-coordinated skull mitts, Red and I would surely be the toast of our small town (if we ever dared to venture out among the natives, that is).