May 2005

A Man’s Gotta Do

It is with great sadness…blah…blah… In exactly two month’s time the Medical Research Council will be shutting down the place where I work. This is inconvenient because I’ve still got a lot of work to do. Over the next few weeks something’s got to go and it’s going to be PooterGeek. I’ll keep the comments […]

Read More

Beardy-Weirdies

Reading that thing on The Guardian site about Roman soldiers wearing socks and open-toed sandals, I was reminded that this week is the Cambridge Beer Festival. To enjoy the whole event cheaply, two of my happily hetero female friends in town used to pretend to be a couple (for discount Campaign for Real Ale membership) […]

Read More

Oh, The Stupidity!

No analysis and no satire, I know, but I just want to say to as many people as possible right now that this policy is so wrong on so many levels that I can scarcely believe that it’s being proposed: More than 100,000 people could get onto the property ladder in the next five years […]

Read More

Deep Street

Via The Motley Fool I found these impressive examples of trompe l’oeil pavement art. Remember: the chalk is only 2D. Blair on top seal dipping a toe mirror man bulky laptop

Read More

Not McPassingOff

Usually I only knock McDonald’s when they are particularly nasty and stupid. It warms my heart to know that a company that beat them in a case you’d have thought McDonald’s would win hands down are, four years later, is still selling East Asian fast food under the cheeky name “McChina“.

Read More

Pan-(a)sexual

Via Beth at Mindfull Chatter [sic] I came upon this amazing piece of computer animation. The best version of the 30-second film is the DivX format file [about 8 meg], so Windows users who don’t have it already should download the DivX codec if they want to enjoy the video it at its highest quality. […]

Read More

My Shame

Forgive me, reader, for I have sinned in my thoughts and in my words. My shocking Yazzmonster-style confession is that a tiny part of me had hoped there would be a lower turnout at the UK General Election. I wanted to do a PooterGeek post featuring an Iraqi TV reporter interviewing British people talking about […]

Read More

Scroungers!

BLAIR HAS HOSPITAL TREATMENT AFTER PUTTING BACK INTO NO 10 WORKOUT Michael White, political editor Friday May 20, 2005 The Guardian Tony Blair was taken to hospital last night to receive treatment for a slipped disc suffered while working out in the gym in his Downing Street flat. That’s very convenient for a typical bloody […]

Read More

Anti-Managerialists Make The Case For Managerialism

Regulars will know I have little time for the whining dons who pad out the Times Higher. Hardly a week passes without some lecturer objecting even to the idea of having to divert a moment’s time from valuable work on “cultural changes in the conceptualisation of the authoritative and the factual in social life” (or […]

Read More

A Great Escape

The Web is full of ordinary people from all over the planet whittering on about whatever they want to. Other people all over the planet can read their whitterings for next to nothing. Add a bit of peer review and you have a wonderful meritocracy of whittering. This account of West Bromwich Albion escaping relegation, […]

Read More

Let Us Not Speak Ill Of The Famous

In a development unprecedented in the history of the unholy media, Pope Polly Filler XIV begins the Dianafication of Kylie Minogue within 24 hours of her diagnosis of breast cancer being announced: THE GIRL WHO FELL TO EARTH She seemed almost flawless, an otherworldly embodiment of physical perfection. But now, like thousands of ordinary women […]

Read More

A Case For Dylan

This morning (whilst looking for something else of course) I stumbled upon this post entitled “Even Dylan Hates Hippies” from the ‘Blog the zoo last year. I thought I should share an extract with you (and not even the bit containing the phrase “Rasta wannabe”): Earlier this week Bob Dylan released his memoirs, and in […]

Read More

Triangulation

I can only conclude that Anthony Cox is writing up his thesis currently, because his ‘Blog is on a roll. Check out his views about the infamous Lancet study, this piece about the effectiveness of the MMR vaccine, and his principled dismissal of Google Ads.

Read More

Uncut

Someone came here today looking for “celebs with foreskins”—obviously another reality show that I am missing because I don’t have a television.

Read More

Ethnic Aesthetics

“Any random group of thirty Vietnamese women will contain a dozen who make Julia Roberts look like Lyle Lovett.” P. J. O’Rourke (1994), All The Trouble In The World: The Lighter Side of Overpopulation, Famine, Ecological Disaster, Ethnic Hatred, Plague, and Poverty I’ve written here before that I believe humans are naturally disposed to discriminate […]

Read More

Now This Is Funny

Thanks to Jo Salmon for drawing my attention to MP Tom Watson‘s return to ‘Blogging. One of his General Election stories beats all mine hands down: Yesterday, I went out in the High Street with a life size cardboard cut-out of Michael Howard. The results were interesting – mainly comic,sometimes disturbing but mostly, for a […]

Read More

Laugh? I Almost Voted Tory

Often I write stuff here and, as I click ‘Publish’, I think, “Is that really funny or am I just deluding myself? Has sitting alone here in my pyjamas reading the news on the Web sent me a bit mad?” Perhaps my cackling at the absurdity of life, politics, and everything is in fact a […]

Read More

My New Fashion Guru

I went to Auriol‘s wedding Auriol, Pete, and all[click image to enlarge] dressed like this: Counsell when I could have gone dressed like this: Rodman Dennis Rodman: there’s a man who knows how to accessorize a pair of shades. [Stolen from Go Fug Yourself.] [The rest of the pics should be on their way to […]

Read More

Northern People Are So Cute

From BBC Sport: Cuban legend Kindelan had beaten Khan in the lightweight final in Athens, but he had no answer to the Briton in front of a passionate Bolton crowd. After a cagey opening, Khan exploded on to the offensive and showed brilliant hand speed to prevail 19-13 on points. … “I managed alright,” said […]

Read More

Roadkill

I once put it to Norm jokingly that one reason he has the patience to pick through the foul-smelling giblets of articles like Madeleine Bunting’s in yesterday’s Guardian is that he has spent years marking terrible student essays. The truth is it’s because he is a top bloke. Rather him than me though.

Read More

Two Tragedies

Michael Jackson’s story is Darth Vader’s in reverse. In Star Wars, a whiny, sexually frustrated, white man-child no one trusts turns, via hideous disfigurement, into an all-conquering, super-cool black guy who first made it big in the 70s.

Read More

A Beautiful Moment

Fareena Alam, editor of British Muslim magazine Q-News is on Any Questions. I enjoyed a delicious frisson listening to the campaigner against racism and for the right of young women in the West to wear the hijab (er, even on passport photos) complain that young people wear hooded tops in order to commit crimes without […]

Read More

Hit And Mitz

I still haven’t forgiven my parents for not hiring The Three Degrees to perform at my confirmation. This the kind of scar Philip Green’s boy will never have to bear.

Read More

Ch- Ch- Ch- Changes

I’ve been tinkering a bit, so do please tell me if you have any difficulty posting comments here or linking to any part of this site. In addition to the under-the-bonnet/hood modifications, I have started using the “Links” feature of WordPress for things I notice that are either too small for a full post or […]

Read More
Older Posts