Over the last day or so I’ve been engaged in a scientific argument (of sorts) on Twitter with a user by the name of @Adam4004. While I would love to make the infuriating futility of the false equivocations, straw-man arguments, and dishonest logic of his claims the basis of this week’s post, it will have to wait for another time. As is so often the case there will always be certain other events occurring in the world that prompt those of us with a predilection for passionate ranting to jettison our current plans and instead focus on the hot potato that has suddenly landed in our laps. This week, that potato is the idea of offence; I don’t mean the wooden thing that separates your garden from next door, that’s a fence – I mean the idea of causing offence, or of being offended, and what prompted me to talk about it this week was the fact that, yet again, Jeremy Clarkson has said something amazingly fucking stupid. Read more “Sittin’ on offence”
This week, on a couple of occasions, I found myself locked in a bathroom, crying like a girl who had just seen her favourite dolly viciously decapitated by the razor-sharp jaws of the family dog. I make no apologies for that, just as I make none for the fact that I shall again be talking a little about myself in this post (it is after all, the subject I know best). What prompted these highly-emotional sabbaticals to the nearest toilet was the fact that, on Thursday, it had been twenty years since Freddie Mercury, one of my all-time heroes, had been lost to AIDS. So, in honour of this anniversary, and its patron, this week’s post will have a bit of everything; some ranting, some religion, a little bit of love and joy, obviously some music, drama, and celebration of life, and perhaps a tiny hint of self-analysis. Oh, and I’m afraid to say there’ll be a bit of Ben Elton as well … sorry. Read more “The Fairy Fella’s Master-Stroke”
Having spent last weekend gallivanting around that London, determined to put in whatever effort was required to enjoy, at all costs, the one big treat I had afforded myself this year (namely seeing the awesome Within Temptation at the Brixton Academy with my fellow radio 4 radical, Simon), I returned to a rather hectic week of work, domestic chores, and an attempt to rectify the recent sexual laziness that has managed to creep in between my boyfriend and I by trying to have it every day (and in every logistically feasible way) this week. Okay, you probably didn’t want to know that, and I apologise for the mental bleach you’ll now require to help rinse any unseemly images out of your head, but I was trying to find the most efficient way I could of bringing together the subjects of “fun”, “hard work”, and “my boyfriend” in the opening paragraph of this, a post for my Raven in celebration of his 30th birthday. Now, be good, click the “Read More” link, and I promise I’ll try to keep any talk of leather and buggery to a minimum. Read more “About a boy”
Before you get the wrong idea I should probably point out that the title of this post in no way refers to doubts that anyone may have in regards to my parentage (since there aren’t any); neither does it refer to anyone else’s, so there is no need to go calling “The Jeremy Kyle Show” asking for a DNA test, lie detector results, or a quick go on their “loud obnoxious dickhead” manufacturing plant. The title is, in fact, nothing more than yet another in a continuing series of weak puns, this time conjured up to reference Richard Dawkins’ book, “The God Delusion”, and the relationship my father, who this week celebrates his 65th birthday, has with it. Given that, this post is therefore mostly aimed at, and dedicated to, my dad, a man who is probably far from alone in wishing that Dawkins’ most controversial work had, like his latest book, featured a larger number of illustrations and a smaller number of large words. Read more “The Dad Confusion”
A while ago, purely for the purposes of my own private amusement, I wrote a song about the company I work for, and some of the eclectic folk I share an office with. I say “song”, it was more a selection of English words, arranged badly into sentences, and desperately in need of a better author who could put them to good use. The song itself was pretty lame, and the idea as a whole was even lamer, so for that reason alone it will probably never see the light of day. That said, however, there are a few lines from it that I would like to share (albeit reluctantly) with you, along with some far more appropriate and better arranged words, in memory of Mr. Nicholas Fish; a colleague we were shocked to learn on Monday morning had passed away over the weekend at the terribly young age of 45. Read more “Goodbye, Mr. Fish”
