Andy's Glasses

We have but one ‘proper’ computer at home these days. We used to have loads. At one time, when the girls were allowed to live here, it looked like NASA control in the playroom. But now we have one. Because most of what we do is on ipads. Like writing this shit. Just the way it worked out. Long as you have a keyboard. The ‘computer’ (singular) is attached to a printer. The only one we have that isn’t in the loft waiting for the price of ink cartridges to come down. Loads up there. Price of computer ink still higher than the price of enriched plutonium.

But the computer wasn’t doing its thing. Not properly. In fact it was, in IT speak: ‘fucked’. Had to keep turning it off and on again, then it would work ok-ish for about 30 minutes then slow down to the point where you’re reaching for the sledge hammer. Yet it was only 6 months old. And, thinking about it, it never worked ‘properly’, as a shiny new thing should. At first you think, ahhhh, let it get used to its new home, may take a little time. Like its a fucking puppy. Its not a puppy. Computers, unlike puppies, should be forever, not just for Christmas. But it never improved.

It was a Dell, purchased through Amazon. So I ‘spoke’ to Amazon on ‘chat’. They’re really nice, those chatterers. Somewhere on the Indian subcontinent, I’m gonna guess, but at least they give you good, honest, Indian names. Unlike some at call centres. As per Nahil’s instructions I went onto the Dell website, who sent tendrils of information-seeking-vermin straight into the computer via the intraweb thing, and immediately told me ‘no longer under warranty; go onto the 85p per second ‘help-line’ or just fuck off and buy another, ya cheap, complaining shit!’ Something like that.

So I got back to Amazon chat-room (in my mind it was like Slumdog Millionaire) where Surinder said; ‘oh, never mind, we’ll give you a full refund, just send it back’. Which is amazing on one level but creates logistical issues. Like how the fuck do you wrap up a bloody great computer? Ahhh, but this is Amazon. Just put it into a box, stick the return label on it (the last act that useless sodding computer ever performed) and drop it at a collection point. Which happens to be my newspaper shop just round the corner. Which I did at 2.30 on Thursday.

At 4 o’clock we received an email from Amazon saying ‘your card has been credited for the returned computer’. I mean, that is amazing. I can almost forgive them for having that bitch, Alexa, spy for the Russians in my kitchen. And for the rather worrying phenomenon lately that if I look on Amazon for, say, split-crotch underwear, on my ipad at home, when I’m on my work computer; different location, different email, different everything, I’ll get offers of bizarre underwear over there too.

I love Amazon, but remain concerned for my privacy and security. And safe to say, the replacement PC will NOT be a Dell.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Ok, a draw at Newport County was not, perhaps, the ideal result. Against a team about 90 places lower that our current position. But heh, shit happens, no excuses, at the end’a the day, game’a two halves, when push comes to shove, we woz robbed, video would’a saved us, should have had 9 penalties… pick your cliché, I didn’t see the match. Thankfully. But as the entire Newport annual budget is probably less than that for Son Heung Min’s bootlaces, on one level its a great thing. The ‘magic’ of the cup. Though it doesn’t really feel exactly magical when you’re struggling against a bunch of Welsh thugs who travel by public transport. Feels like shit. Yet their trip to Wembley for the replay will probably secure the team financially for the next decade. The real magic of the cup. I can’t deny them that. Even though I’d really, really like to. But it wasn’t to be. So in the next 2 weeks we’re lucky enough to add another match to those against Man United, Arsenal, Juventus and Liverpool. Just what we need.

Could be worse though. Always could be worse. At least we’re in the 4th round. Unlike… some teams of a fairly big, and red, nature. And we might still be in the 5th round, unlike… Liverpool.

Who went out, at home to West Brom. In a match disturbed constantly by the Video Ref. At the behest of the real, non-digital, low-tech, real, flesh’n’bone ref., who asked for lots of clarification. And on some decisions, still ambiguous, he had the incidents shown on his own screen on the touchline. Takes 4 minutes. During which the players get cold and then pull muscles. Because they’re too stupid to work out by themselves that they should actually either keep moving or stretching or put a coat on. One West Brom player pulled a hamstring when play resumed after one incident.

I actually like referees. Real ones. Its not only a really hard job its also a thankless one. Unless you just give penalties to Arsenal all the time and none against them. And what our few VAR matches have shown is that refs actually get it right virtually every time. And when they make mistakes it must just be viewed as part of the game. If not, if everything has to be validated by replays and juries, then it becomes a different game. And come the day when they give managers the right to appeal (and it will happen at some point) then it will become an awful game. At which point I’ll just start watching Bowls. Darts. Rugby, which easily accommodates VARs but also prevents players from harassing refs in any way at all. Now that would be a move forward in football. Would stop ‘Chelsea Syndrome’.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

Its not just cos Rachie’s in Berlin that I’m currently fond of German words. There’s a reason. Always a fucking reason.

The President’s club (agaiaiain???) ‘incident’ of 2018, wouldn’t have been an incident in 1918, or 1968 or probably in 1999. But its a different world now. Generally for the better but as always, the reaction to changing standards is always to go a little beyond where the end-point will probably be. So as you brush the hand of the check-out girl at Tescos whilst taking your change, right now she’s crying ‘RAPE!!!!!’ and ordering her ‘me too’ t-shirt, but within a few months a new status quo will arrive. Not as loud as the last one and not quite as hypersensitive to perceived infringement. That’s where the term ‘cut me some slack’ comes in.

Its all about zeitgeist. Which in fact is now about ‘cleaning out the closet’ of crimes past. In the movie industry, thanks to Harvey W. and Kevin S. And in the modelling world, the workplace generally, and all going back as far as you like. Unless ‘underage’ is involved in which case add another several decades.

Because we’re now not only in the post-groping phase of enlightenment, we’re in the post-feminist era and also one of seemingly increasing gender ambiguity. Or gender non-specificity. You’re not allowed to gen(d)eralise, you can’t assume someone’s a ‘girl’ just because they have long blond hair, massive tits and is wearing a flouncy pink off-the-shoulder number with 9-inch heels. What would you be thinking??? Its just a ‘person of as-yet unspecified bits and desires’.

So how long can the Oscars continue with its totally unzeitgeisty and horrifically binary ‘best actor’ and ‘best actress’ dinosaurism? Its as bad as sexual abuse to some kind of trans… thingumy. They need to have ‘best person doing some acting in the role of a gender unspecified nature with nothing at all manly or womanly implied or stated’. Jay Leto would definitely have won that for the Dallas Buyers Club. Or they could have ‘best thing in a movie’. Or even ‘best thing (born with a nob)’ and best thing (born without). Ok, it obviously needs more thought. But it just can’t go on or I’ll have to boycott the whole thing. Sometimes you have to take a stand. And sometimes you’re better off just going inside to watch the football.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

If you attend a party and someone gets stabbed, are you guilty? If, obvs, you didn’t actually do the stabbing? Some kind of ‘guilt by association’ perhaps? Or maybe you were in the kitchen when it happened in the garden and knew neither party… at the party.

Thus, is Jonathan Mendelsohn ‘guilty’ of crimes for merely attending the Presidents Club dinner at which blatant sexism (but no stabbings, fortunately, not with knives anyway) took place? Is he guilty just by being at a place where sleazy and dirty behaviour occurred?

Jeremy Corbyn has sacked Mendelsohn from the Labour Front benches in the House of Lords, where he ‘lives’. He’s still a Lord, Corbyn is not yet sufficiently powerful to remove a peerage, though obviously, come the glorious day of the revolution, the peers will all be up against the wall with a blindfold and last fag, along with leaders of industry and all others who employ (ABUSE!!!) his working men. Oh, and women.

Its not a crime, in Corbyn-world, to consort with terrorists. Flirt with them. Court them. Befriend them as ‘allies in a struggle’. Even if those terrorists are proven murderers and bombers and jihadis and knee-cappers or whatever. So yesterday, when there was a motion in Parliament to proscribe Hezbollah from marching here, as they do every year, the motion was denied by the Labour front bench. ‘They are political, not terrorists’, even though their ‘flag’ has an AK47 on it. ‘They’re downtrodden workers’, even though they’re not. So Labour wouldn’t join the motion. Against an organisation who pledge not just the destruction of the State of Israel, which would, in that weird fucking world, be almost acceptable. Hezbollah state their aim is to destroy Jews, and stress, NOT just Israel, but Jews. And Corbyn, whilst never being ‘antisemitic’ himself, has always been very comfortable around those who are.

So back at the Dorchester, Lord Mendelson is there, as are many of high and noble people. And a bunch of superrich squillionaire bum-pinchers. Philip Green is a regular. With his knighthood or without. Many attendees were completely unaware of the ‘goings on’ in terms of groping and molesting the working girls (in every sense as in previous ‘dinners’, sex-workers had been shipped in at the end of the evening), and you can perhaps assume that Mendelson was there to network and perhaps even contribute to the undoubtedly worthy charities.

But Corbyn sacked him nonetheless. For what? For being at a place where bad things happened? Or for being a wealthy Jew, successful businessman and almost the worst crime of all, a Blairite.

Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re NOT out to get you.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

Its the second week of Liladays. And… Lila’s here. Asleep for now, as per instruction 1472.87A/9726:e71. And I’m glad, because otherwise she might have read in the paper about the terrible scandal of the Presidents Club annual charidee dinner at the Dorchester, no less. Which raised a quite amazing (until you read who was there) 2 million quid, which was given to various charities. Who’ve now all given it back. Cos its ‘tainted money’. Raised from drunk billionaires whilst they were groping and molesting women. It was, by all accounts, a tribute evening to Harvey Weinstein. As it has been every year. Molest 1 or more of the 130 ‘entertainment’ girls employed for the night, and to make you feel like your not a totally amoral abusive man-handling fucking neanderthal, bid on a ridiculously expensive item in the auction to correct the moral downslide. Which was concurrently downsliding all the way down a blonde’s cleavage. The other hand raised for the bid. “I’ll bid 50 GRANDDDD”, he would slur, having drunk his fill of very expensive champers and 40 year old single malts, “for a 20 minute ride on a Boris bike acherley signed by Boris hissself, hic!” Then this suave and debonair gentleman would undo his £5,000 Armani dinner suit and slap his dick on the table. Haaaaa!!!… (drunken laughter all round at the ultimate nob-joke). And that’s why the President’s Club doesn’t admit women. Unless they have a nob they can slap on the table. Though it can’t be someone else’s.

How this has endured for 35 years is almost beyond imagination. But only almost. Because whatever the facade of chauffeur-driven high browiness and nouveau-riche purchased attempts at ‘class’, even Lords and true gents, they’re just men/boys. And you can take the boys out of the sleaze but, apparently, you can never take the sleaze out of these boys. Who will all doubtless feel a sense of entitlement just due to their wealth if nothing else.

The ‘entertainer’ girls sign a massive disclaimer that also silences them ‘for ever’. What happens in the Dorchester stays in the Dorchester. Until this week. When one of those girls, this one an undercover (nothing sleazy in that, its what you call spying in the journo world) reporter for the Financial Times. And she was groped by billionaires, fondled by financiers, molested by moguls and generally was totally appalled and amazed at what happened there on such an industrial scale.

All the girls should have worn pre-emptive ‘me too’ dresses. Or perhaps ‘me to, ya muthafucka’.

What’s perhaps most incredible is the timing of this event. Right at the very tipping point over the entire globe, well, the western bit of it, when the zeitgeist is massively against ‘boys just being boys’ when its at the expense of the girls, and yet it went ahead anyway, with no change to its mission statement.

Lucky I hid it before Lila saw it, or chewed it.

Happy Thursday

A xxxx

Nigel Farage, that stalwart of total Britishness, the most Europhobic man in history, smiling beer-drinking chain-smoker and one-time leader of the political party known as ‘UKIP’, if you remember them, has stated that if the current leader of the party, Henry Bolton, doesn’t resign, ‘the party could be history in 18 months’ time!!!!’ I reckon Nigel is about 3 years too late in his maths. They’re already a massive irrelevance in the political world and therefore we can only view this latest debacle for the fun it represents rather than in terms of any ‘impact’ on the politics. Which there won’t be. Any of it.

UKIP had but one message: get out of Europe. Done that, move along. But there’s nothing there to move along to. So they fight among themselves, elect a new leader every 3 months, comment on the process of how we leave Europe and then go back to infighting.

In a meeting on Sunday the ‘board’ or whatever they are, of UKIP showed a unanimous vote of ‘no confidence’ in their leader. But still he refuses to go.

Henry Bolton’s ‘crime’ was to leave his wife. Ok, to leave his 3rd wife, so its not like its anything new. And take up with a very unglamorous ‘glamour modew’ called Jo Marney. Bolton is 54, Marney just 25. OMG!!!! Older man leaves wife for younger woman!!!! Surely not. That’s never happened before, has it? There was some minor ‘uproar’ but essentially no-one cared nor cares now.

Until Jo Marney sent some texts. About black people, generally, which weren’t very nice, and specifically about Meghan Markle, which were rather horrid. And as Meg has been given instant ‘national treasure’ status due to upcoming nuptials of a royal nature, Jo Marney instantly becomes persona non grata, in my house at least.

Henry Bolton won’t resign because, as he reckons, he’s all about the Party and his personal life is no-one’s business but his own. Which is true. He wants to shag an anorexic peroxide blonde schoolgirl tart, that’s his business. But he should have picked one who isn’t a racist.

Its not about his personal choices. Its about appropriate choices. Particularly as UKIP have always trodden a very fine line between centre-rightism and outright xenophobia and racism. So is it appropriate that their leader, however well spoken and clever, is shacked up with someone with those views? Great judgment, Henry.

But really it all falls under the category “who gives a shit?” because UKIP died the moment the Brexit vote was counted.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

There’s a wonderful book that opens with the sentence: “Who is John Gault?” And then it spends about 1400 pages of tiny little, 5-point type telling you. But today, to save you reading Atlas Shrugged in its entirety, I’ll start with a different question.

Who is Kyle Edmund?

Won’t take many pages to answer. He’s a tennis player, inn’he? And he’s ENGLISH. Not ‘British’, certainly not ‘Scottish’ and definitely not ‘European’ soon. And last night he reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open in Melbourne. One of our own. And that is quite amazing because until last week I’d never even heard of the man. Not that I spend much time reading up on the obscure international tennis tournaments in Abu Dhabi and Chechnia and Madagascar through the year. I only like Wimbledon. But the ‘opens’ are big. I have to take note. And this pale and pallid, skinny ginger-haired kid starts winning, in temperatures that even normal people with normal colouring are struggling with, and I need to get involved.

I thought he was Scottish. The nightmare. Just as it looks like we’ve finally got rid of Andy Murray, here come Ginger McTavish to replace him. But no. He’s English. Like… oh, like Tim Henman.

All the old ‘British champs’ are pundits on tv. They have to be. They never won any prize money so they have to pay the rent. And when they come on the little flash-up badge says ‘Buster Mottram, top British player 1982 to 87′, or some such flattering nonsense. He was ranked 873 in the world and reached half of a ’round of 16′ match before losing the rest of it to a Lithuanian schoolgirl with biceps like Arnie. They never mention his involvement with the far-right. Not relevant. Only to me.

Andy Murray, for all his faults (that’ll be: miserable and Scottish), ‘is’ or possibly ‘was’ (depending on the success of the surgery) an amazingly brilliant tennis player. Tim Henman never was. Buster Mottram certainly wasn’t. But they all start with promise. And Kyle Edmund is certainly doing that. He’s 23, ranked 46 in the world and he’s in a grand slam semi-final.

England have even won some cricket in Aus too. The One Day Internationals. Smashed those Aussies out of the park. Brilliant. Easy. World Class. Shame about the Ashes.

So all is looking good. Especially for Alexis Sanchez who is to be paid by Manchester United between 450 and 500 thousand pounds a week (depending on where you read it). I don’t give a shit about Alexis one way or the other. But to give you an idea of how massively, expensively destabilising this is going to be for the Premiership, he’ll be earning more than twice what Eden Hazard gets paid. Four times Harry Kane. Greedy agents and stupid, desperate managers, the horns of the devil.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

I never quite realised how 16-year-old me was such a revolutionary, forward-thinking, free-spirited music pioneer. Until yesterday when I read it in the Times. Not in those words, precisely, but a lot of boxes were ticked.

When the first Roxy Music album came out in 1972 I was indeed 16 and had a Saturday job in the ‘world famous’ Mr Byrite chain, in Ilford High Road. Class. My Byrite sold ultra high fashion, mega-ultra-low quality clothes for young people to have a great night out in, then throw away. Cos they were cheap, so something had to give. And in Ilford in 1972, that something wasn’t going to be style.

There were about 20 of us working there on Saturdays and between us we’d buy about 4 or 5 albums every week. And that week, Roxy Music’s first offering came along and we played it. As with everything, we played it deafeningly loud. Well, loud enough that you couldn’t hear someone say “DO YOU HAVE THIS IN BLUE, SIZE 15????”

I never realised until yesterday what a total game-changer that album was. And that the band was. I never realised that it had a sound that was original and unique combing many existing musical styles and incorporating new ones into the mix. Songs without a chorus. Songs that changed half way through. Odd time signatures. An even odder voice with Bryan Ferry’s falsetto yodelling away. Well, in fact, I did realise all of this at the time, and more. I explained it more in these terms: “iss fuckin’ great, dat album, innit?” Sorry, that’s how one spoke in Ilford, circa 1972 (and 73, 74, 75… still do).

I went to see Roxy back then too, at the Astoria Finsbury Park, and they were simply brilliant. Like Bowie, like Talking Heads, they were not ‘merely’ musicians, they were art graduates and believed in the integrity of the entire performance. From the songs to Bryan Ferry’s socks. Everything.

But what really sold that album to me, back when I was was 16, was the cover. Judge books by covers, albums by covers, its all the same. That’s why so much marketing budget is always invested in cover photos. A beautiful girl, scantily clad, that was fairly standard. But that look of fragile vulnerability… that’ll sell an extra 400,000. If only to 16 year-old boys.

I played the album yesterday (well, the cd) and its still brilliant. Matured with age. Even though Mel hates it. But really, its a game of two halves. Cos the first ‘half’ (don’t really have ‘halves’ on cds, but ya know what I mean) is mind-blowingly brilliant, the rest merely ok. Unlike Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust album, which also came out in 1972, which is 100% genius. But in Virginia Plain (the solo single track wasn’t on the original album but is always included now) is the best lyric ever. “… where my Studebaker takes me, that’s where I’ll make my stand…” Simply love that. Note: doesn’t work if you substitute ‘Studebaker’ with ‘Prius’ or ‘Gee Whizz’.

Lila’s dad said something interesting yesterday, that WASN’T about the conservative party, pointing out that the Alexis Sanchez swap-move to Manchester United brings Henrikh Mkhitaryan to Arsenal in a straight, no cash swap. So how is that ‘good business’ for Arsenal? To swap a world class superstar with a proven record for… someone else. Its like swapping Harry Kane for a goalpost, straight swap, and trying to convince everyone its a ‘good deal’ and good for the club.

I think Wenger’s going a bit senile.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Sometimes you go see a movie, a real 5* rated unequivocal ‘winner’ by all who rate such things and your expectations are sky high and… and… nyeh, it was ok. I fucking hate that. The movie marketers do their thing, ply their magic and convert any third-rate sequel to a shitty original, in the minds of the critics, to ‘masterpiece’ status because its made by a big studio and stars Tom Cruise. Or Arnie. Or has the name ‘Star Wars!!’ attached to it.

And other times you see a film that’s somehow ‘quieter’, but still rated very highly. Not in any way a ‘blockbuster’ but some kind of independent movie that just gets rave reviews. Something like ‘3 Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri’, f’rinstance. Which, coincidentally, I saw last night.

And quite frankly, and in the absence of any discernible hyperbole, it is the best film ever. Ok, definitely the best film of 2018, and you might as well include 2017 in that too. Its just wonderful. How can it not be? It stars Frances McDormand, the world’s most unlikely superstar. She looks like your cleaner, never smiles and wears less make-up than I do. (For the record, just to illuminate this point; I don’t wear make-up. I AM this beautiful quite naturally). And yet she won an Oscar for Fargo (the only other real candidate for ‘best film ever’) and in 3 Billboards she simply shines. But being McDormand, she shines in the dullest of drab ways. And she does ‘dysfunctional’ better than anyone. Maybe being married to Joel Coen for all those years does that to someone, I’d be surprised if it didn’t. And best of all, even playing the tragically ‘hurt mother’ (losing a child in horrible way; not that there are good ways), she is no saccharine goody-goody. As the film progresses you gradually, systematically, lose a lot of sympathy for her, whilst she still remains a kind of heroine.

It has bouts of violence and is fantastically, drily, darkly funny all the way through. And it is quirky, in a very Fargo-esque, small-town, fucked-up, semi-psychotic American way. Its almost The definitive ‘indie’ movie. Yet is written and directed by a Brit, not a Coen.

Woody Harrelson is in it too. And he too is simply fantastic. Compassionate and menacing at the same time, but smiling as he does both.

3 Billboards doesn’t have a dance sequence by Fred Astaire, nor any significant space-rocket fighters shooting at each other. But it does have a dwarf. And it manages to leave almost everything completely unresolved, yet is very satisfying. And whilst in no way whatsoever a ‘feelgood’ movie, it leaves you feeling really good.

I fucking loved that film.

Go see.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

Boris Johnson doesn’t so much ‘shoot from the hip’ even though his hips are pretty humungous, as ‘speaks out his arse’ which is of a similar degree of humungousness. So if you think that endless cycling and jogging will make you fit and slim and gorgeous; just look to Boris for that model. Like a model of the Taj Mahal topped with straw.

Let’s build a bridge to France, the foreign minister said. Its easy. And logical. And it says lots (to President Macron, who just happened to be standing there when he said it) about togetherness, about unity, cohesion and brotherhood, that we should, logically, become ‘joined’ permanently. Awwwww, nice.

But totally fucking stupid. 120 billion pounds worth of stupid. Because that’s a conservative estimate for building a 21 mile span bridge between our fine nations. They should’a built one in 1724 when it would have cost 73 guineas, 15 shillings and seven-p’nce. Ok would’a been made of wood but think of how much easier it would have been to fight about 300 years of wars against our ‘best friends’ if the troops could have just walked across to fight. Which is pretty much all we did for those 300 years; fight the French.

But now they’re our BFFs and we want a (fucking) bridge. Well, Boris wants a bridge.

And in return for our 120 bil, the price of wine would drop by 42p a bottle and a Camembert would be at least 12p cheaper. Plus, the added bonus of having the French side not in Calais itself but in Sangatte next door. Making it sooooo much easier for all the economic migrants/jihadis to just stroll over at their leisure. Even worse, it would get the French here more quickly and easily too. Holy shitttt!! Didn’t think of that, did’ja Boris??

France really doesn’t need to be any closer. Its a beautiful country filled with beautiful women, as long as you don’t talk to them. I can get to Paris in 3 hours on Eurostar. I can get to Calais in about the same time by car through the tunnel. I can fly there in less than an hour or get a leisurely ferry if I really want to. I don’t need a fucking bridge. Whereas, speaking for the nation (as I’m authorised to do) 120 billion pounds goes quite a long way. Much further than just 21 sodding miles.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx