Springwatch

Oddly enough I thought we were pretty much into summer now. Not that the weather would be any clue as of late. Let me start by saying that I love nature programmes. Sit the ill man down in front of some meercats or some gazelle or some anteaters and he's happy as a pig in shit. Anyway, I was rather looking forward to Springwatch, BBC's backyard nature show featuring bird watcher and former 'Goodie' Bill Oddie. It's a live show featuring a variety of garden, parkland and forest wildlife. Very nice. The live aspect worried me a touch. I mean, animals can be terribly frustrating things to observe, doing the strangest, most interesting things when you aren't looking and then when you have the camera on them they go and take a (metaphorical) fag break..... It seemed to work ok except for one very annoying aspect. It seems in the past few years there has been a tendency for nature documentaries to fall into mawkishness and anthropomorphism. I can just about understand why names are given to animals being studied in isolation, but it seems that every bugger is at it now. The worst part of this trend is that the subjects are not only given names but they have human emotions and attitudes bestowed upon them. There seems to be an insidious belief that people will not watch something(animals/vegetables/minerals/BB Contestants) unless they can directly relate to it, unless the subject of the programme can be shown to have felt and experienced similar things to the viewer. How long until The Beechgrove Garden starts giving us 'A Day In The Life of Fergus The Tomato Plant'? Who wouldn't tune into that? Seriously though, Springwatch kind of lost me after about ten minutes when I realised they had given family names to the different sets of birds they were observing. In a later snippet Bill Oddie explains the behaviour of the mother bird in terms of 'bad parenting'. Argh!!! Another bloody soap opera............. I don't think it's as bad as i'm making out, i'm just slightly miffed that a very good idea for a tv show has been messed up a tad by pandering to a perception amongst tv people that the public cannot be enraptured and entertained without the injection of some kind of 'human interest' angle. Anyway, go watch it tomorrow, or check the rather good link and tell me i'm talking out of my ring.............

Aw Fuck, It's Back

Jezza, A hero to millions.......................... I had become quite used to my sunday evenings being serene affairs in the tv stakes. I don't watch much tv as it is, but as things stood, sunday was as good a night as any for a bit of telly. No soaps to studiously avoid and only the unfathomably popular Heartbeat to be given a bodyswerve. Theres usually some serenely dull documentary on, a film or two maybe. If yr very lucky a bit of comedy. Nice. Not so tonight. Flicking the tv on after dinner I was met by the voice of the worlds most annoying man. No, not Michael Winner, but it's a good call....... Yes, Top Fucking Gear is back. Dull men getting erections over cars nobody could ever hope to afford basically. The worst part of it is, if that was all it was I wouldn't have a problem. Theres nothing intrinsically wrong with drooling over the latest Ferrari or Lamborghini, should that be your bag. Many men seem to be genetically programmed to do so. What really tits me off about the show though is the fact that all three of it's presenters fancy themselves as stand up comedians. Oh lord, save us do. Save us from the short arse who shouts all the time and talks in EXCLAMATION MARKS!!!!!!!!!!!!. Save us from the public schoolboy who looks, sounds and probably smells like every pub bore you've ever had the misfortune to meet. Save us finally from 'Jezza'. Every time this spaz faced tit gurgles with smug self satisfaction about the cars he's owned, or brays like wounded animal when he does a skid thingie in a car I not only feel like punching the carpet headed cunt's head clean off, I also feel like punching myself for actually wasting even five minutes of my life on such mediocre guff. Bring back the old Top Gear I say. Beard wearing middle aged blokes, properly observed speed limits, Morris Marina's and driving gloves. Lovely.

The Gardens Of North Kelvinside

Down By The River

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home pt 6

The tatty old pier seemed to have emptied of all human traffic mere seconds after he arrived. He had actually been leaning against the barrier at the end of the pier for about an hour but he had a habit of going into trances and losing all track of time. Two years in this place had brought him nothing but grief and boredom. The pier was where he went to switch off. A distant and only vaguely remembered aunt had bequeathed him a small house in the town and he had jumped at the prospect of leaving the grimy confines of his home town and his miserable night watchman job. He hadn't banked on the insular, suspicious natives, nor had he imagined how hard it would be to make a living in such a place. He knew now. His current job was every bit as crappy as his last. He worked in Mr de Giacomo's ice cream kiosk during 'high season' and worked in the old man's chippy during the long, cold rain lashed winter months. There was little to choose between the jobs as far as was concerned. His desire to spit on every ice cream cone he made for the mewling little brats that queued up on saturday mornings with their pocket money was equalled only by his desire to piss in the vinegar bottle in the chip shop. In fact, he had done just that one friday night. None of the loud, boorish drunken fuckers that came in during his shift had the slightest clue that their suppers had been drizzled in urine. He had laughed about it to himself at the time. He was literally pissing on their chips, as much as they were metaphorically pissing on his. He had nobody to share the joke with though and his sense of triumph wore off alarmingly quickly. Staring out to sea as the sun finally began it's evening descent, he realised that he had two choices. Get on the train and go back to the hole of a town he grew up in, back to his sadistic father, valium and gin addicted mother and his deranged sex offender brother or stay put and count his blessings. Even getting out of the family home and into a flat wouldn't be enough to drag him back. The local hard men knew who he was, knew who his brother was, would ensure he didn't get a nights sleep ever again. Every memory he had of home consisted of a shroud of grey filth and dullness. Even sunny summer days were shit and when you got home it might as well have been pissing down with rain for all it mattered. There was no contest really. He turned finally and wandered back along the sun dappled walkway towards the promenade. His existance was shite, a trial, endless boredom. It just wasn't life threatening anymore.

Cheap Nostalgia Shot

Hello. Someone shoved a very amusing link my way over on myspace. It put a silly big smile on my chops for five minutes and theres no reason why it shouldn't have the same effect on you........... Childrens TV Theme If you find yourself utterly distraught at the traumatic childhood memories these bring back to you, I can only apologise and say that such an outcome was not my intention. All I will say is that all the important ones are there. The Flumps, Bagpuss, Jamie And His Magic Torch...................Rainbow Beyond that, not a lot to say tonight. I seem to be in the rather pleasant situation of being able to keep abreast of all things Big Brother without actually having to watch it, thanks mainly to the commentary of Steve, Clairwil and Billy. I have to admit, you would need to tie me down and prop my eyelids open, Clockwork Orange style to get me to watch the show for any longer than about a minute. I work with enough arseholes as it is without having to watch more of them on my tv.

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home pt 5

I wasn't sure how I had come to be in the police cell. I was alone, much to my relief and still prone to rubbing the rather painfull lump on my head as if I was convinced such an action might make it go away. The cell was a brightly lit and featureless little room with a small bunk on which I sat and a toilet and wash basin in the corner. I had used the basin to take a drink and splash cold water on my face. The water obviously wasn't terribly potable, but I was thirsty and I would have wrung the sweat out of a tramps sock at that moment in time. I gave up trying to sit up straight and swung my legs up onto the little bed and gave my brain a rest from trying to piece together the past hour or so. The one thing I was certain of was that I had fallen asleep on a park bench and had a strange yet not unpleasant dream. In the dream, which I still vividly recall, I had made my way back to the guest house I had left that morning. By this time it was getting dark and a streetlights were coming on. On ringing the bell, I was faced not with the embittered old swine that had kicked me out that morning, but the young woman that had served me in the bakery soon after. Her face had struck me a little dumb at the time. Very fresh, smooth pale skin, she was what you might call plain in certain company, but I considered her to be quite entrancing. She also had the most astonishing pair of pale blue eyes. She looked me over from the doorway with a quizical smile and asked if she could help me. I told her I required a room for the night. She informed me the house was full but said she would organise something. I foresaw myself returning to the attic room. Instead she led me into a small, tidy, well furnished room on the first floor. It being a dream I failed to question the logic of me sleeping in what was quite obviously the land lady's quarters and promptly got ready for bed. I was in the bed when she appeared in the doorway wearing absolutely nothing. She clambered in and as is usual with any pornographic dreams I have, I couldn't contain my excitement. She made the first move by undoing my pyjamas and I responded in a fashion usually reserved for predatory animals and desperate schoolboys having their first sexual encounter. It was at about this point I felt the crack of something hard on my head. The room and the woman disappeared to be replaced by a tarmac path and a lovely view of a pair of shiny black boots. I also felt something trickling down the side of my face. I concluded that it was something that would be resolved in time and I probably shouldn't worry about it. I passed out again but failed to dream.

Well, That Was Fun.....

Regular readers(Hi Billy, Hi Rob, Hi Clairwil) will know that from time to time I have been known to blog about the fact that i'm too tired to blog. Last night I was too tired to blog about the fact that I was too tired to blog and I collapsed into bed at about half eleven. Two days tramping about in the East Lothian countryside does that to a chap. Anyway, i'm back now and enjoying a rare monday off. Enjoy the photos, i'll have part five concocted for sometime later this evening.

The Ill Man Takes A Well Earned Weekend Break

With a bit of luck the weather will be half decent. I'll be back on sunday night, by which time i'll have another 'Wake Me Up.............' ready. Cheers.

Random Things Fucking The Ill Man Off At This Moment In Time

The woman in Boots who wants to talk to you while you buy yer sarnies. NO!!! I give you money, you give me change and receipt, I go back to work. Right? Wrong. Instead I wait a fucking eternity in the queue as you move as slowly as fucking possible and yack away like a fucking budgie to blank faced office blobs. Today she was cleaning her touch screen till when I arrived. It was obviously not in locked mode as her dusting had fucked it up completely. Just what I needed you silly old sod. HMV have started to employ people to walk the floor of the shop and pester customers, asking if they 'need any assistance'. If I want your assistance I shall ask for it. GO AWAY!!! Is it just me, but does this not remind you of the days as a child when you would stand at the comic rack in RS McColl or WH Smith for about half an hour reading Shoot and Roy Of The Rovers only for some old crone to utter those very same words? I know it's not their aim, but it makes me feel like i'm under surveillance, under suspicion. If any HMV employee is reading this can they please have a word with someone and get them to fucking stop it. Or else i'm off to Virgin and Fopp for my music. Capeesh??? ...........and no, that wan't a Peter Andre poster I had up my trouser leg as I left.................... Talking of WH Smith, has anyone seen their latest stunt? Maybe it's unique to the branch in Glasgow city centre, but every time you get to the till, you get some oversized fucking chocolate bar or worthless non seller book or DVD punted at you. Yes, that's right, you've come in for a copy of Peoples Friend or Anglers Monthly or Motorsport or Hot Hatch Bitches, you've had ample time to visit the chocolate bar stand and make any possible confectionary decisions as well as take into consideration the multitude of overpriced movies and tatty biographies they have on sale. It's obviously not enough to come into the shop and just purchase a magazine or a paper. They obviously believe that miraculously, by the time you reach the check out you will suddenly have been seized by an insane craving for their 'Three For Two' offer on the 'Super Fucking Giant, Size Of Your Arm' Toblerones that they so bloody obviously cannot shift by conventional means. This is the contempt the people who run these shops hold you in. It also demostrates their contempt for their employees as they seem more than happy to turn them from till assistants into cheap arse hawkers who can't hide their apologetic demeanour every time they half heartedly try and do a bit of 'selling on'. Next!!!

Too Tired Tonight

Long hard day and a nasty wee hangover haven't helped much. Anyway, i've been poking about in myspace for new bands and I keep coming across things I like. Four of them can be found in the bottom row of the friends section on ill mans myspace page. Keep an eye out, because i'll have four more next week.

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home Pt 4

It wasn't good for his health. He knew that much. The sea air was meant to do you good but it didn't help that he was sitting in terror staring out at the horizon as it wobbled gently in the afternoon haze. The seaside cottage he had rented from Mike at work had seemed perfect to him. 'Rustic Charm' was the phrase he had used. Loads of character he said, with a slightly smug air that only now seemed significant. On arriving at the cottage he found himself pleasantly surprised. He had expected a damp, delapidated old dump and had booked in at a B&B in the nearby town as a precaution for such an eventuality. What he found was a handsome whitewashed little house with flowers in the windows and a sparse but clean interior. He decided there and then to call on to the hotel and cancel the room. 'Nice one Mike' was his first clear thought on the matter. All had been fine until he was awoken at about 3am by what sounded like someone shuffling around in oversized slippers. He lay paralysed and stared into the pitch black depths of the room trying to fathom just what it was he was hearing. The noise remained remote, at the other end of the spacious bedroom. He eventually found his voice and called out. 'Hello!' he croaked weakly. The movement ceased almost instantly. When no answer was forthcoming he remained silent fearing he had annoyed the entity pacing about his room. His eyes had started to adjust somewhat to the darkness and he began to make out shapes and forms. None of them seemed to move. He saw the outline of the wardrobe, the coat stand, the chest of drawers, the old bicycle that incongruously rested against the far wall. He was starting to regain the feeling in his body and maybe a little courage and slowly, silently reached for the bedside lamp. He was facing the direction of the door as he pressed the switch. The room illuminated and in the first few seconds he saw directly in front of him all the items he had picked out in the darkness. He also saw something that terrified him beyond words. A small greyhaired, nightshirted figure of indeterminate age and gender stood midway between the bed and the door. Above the midget was a disembodied head covered in a shock of coal black hair. The midget started to turn it's head towards him. The floating head did too. The midget had no face which was terrifying enough. Unfortunately, the head did and his heart stopped for what seemed like an eternity. The glowing eyes and the clown like rictus locked onto him and seemed to dare him to make the next move. He did. His hand was still on the light switch and somewhere along the line his terror addled brain sent out a message to his hand to turn the bloody light back off. The eyes glowed at him in the darkness for another twenty seconds or so before fading. He closed his eyes. The visions returned, images scorched indelibly into his mind. It was preferable to keeping them open though and risk seeing those cold, evil eyes rear out of the darkness again. He sat at the window He had pretty much chain smoked the packet of cigarettes that had been ensconsed at the bottom of his holdall. The coffee he had drunk had wired him up to such a degree that he was feeling sick and rather faint. He hadn't eaten since the night before.He had been up since about six thirty am, having given up on sleep once daylight had started to fill the bedroom. By that time he was on his third nightmare involving 'the face' and really had no desire to ever close his eyes again. That he was able to clearly demarcate the difference between the original experience and the ever distorting dreams he subsequently had only convinced him more that what he had seen was real. As the day wore on he started to rationalise things. He knew he would never return to the bedroom, that he would gather his things from it and sleep in the living room with the TV and the light on. Not ideal, but he was damned if he was going to give up his time off because of some phantasmogrical vision he had in the middle of the night. He remembered a book he had read debunking ghost sightings. Apparently at least a quarter of such encounters were the result of sensory deprivation. It made sense. His half awake brain had gone to town in the imagination department whilst he sat in the darkness and when he turned the light on he caught a brief glimpse of whatever it was his subconscious had been brewing up. Or something. He wished he had the book with him, if only to use as a sort of intellectual security blanket. As the evening wore on, he became more and more relaxed, his appetite returned and he devoured the frozen pizza he had found in the back of the freezer. A few leisurely drams rounded out the night and he got ready to go to sleep in front of a late night phone-in quiz. He dozed and awoke after what seemed like five minutes. The tv was off and the lights were out. Except they weren't. The tv was burbling away from another room and he could see the light from the hallway underneath the door. He was back in the bedroom. The shuffling had started, but it was getting closer and closer. A low whine started to build and the face from the night before descended from the ceiling. The shuffling stopped next to him and he felt a hand on his throat, clasping gently. The whine turned into a gutteral scream as the head, as real as anything belonging to a living being floated all of six inches from his own face. Blackness consumed him and he woke in the living room, again, seemingly only a few minutes after his ordeal. It was 5 am and the first light was beginning to filter through the curtains. His belongings were already in the living room, so it seemed almost churlish and foolhardy not to take heed of the nights events and get the hell out of the house. 'That Bastard Mike' he thought as he got into his car. On hindsight, he was just the sort of malevolent little shit that would send a mate to stay for a week in a haunted house. He toyed with the idea of calling up the B&B again and staying there for the rest of the week. He quickly dismissed it though. He knew he would probably never sleep again, the last thing he needed was to pay through the nose for the priviledge......................

Forthcoming Attractions

The ill man meets Thistle captain Marc Smyth. Photo courtesy of the club chairman. Cheers Brown. The next episode of 'Wake Me Up...........' is in the works for all those interested. A bit of a day all told. Partick Thistle gained promotion to the Scottish First Division today with a heroic vicory over Peterhead. I won't bore you all with the details but it essentially means the club I love is now going in the correct direction and can look forward to some decent crowds and better players next season. I'm a happy little fucker tonight and no mistake......................

A Short Interlude

For all those getting something out of my fictional meanderings, 'Wake Me Up......' will be back soon. I've realised i'll have to give a bit of thought to the peripherals. The main first person thread is easy to map out. It just goes where I tell it to. The little vignettes outside the main story are more of a problem and need a little work. Cheers!

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home pt3 -

I wasn't aware that my actions were being watched. I wasn't aware, solipsist that I am, that anyone would be interested in my aimless maneuverings. Principally because I wasn't interested in theirs. It would seem someone had picked me out from the crowd anyway, because my belongings were in front of the B&B when I got back. I don't consider myself to be an awkward customer on the whole, I let more things go than I really ought to but this was all a little much. After a few minutes of ringing the front doorbell, the landlady appeared, about as pleased to see me as she had been the previous day but with the added menace that came with brandishing a wooden broom. She enquired as to exactly what my business was and why I was bothering her in her housekeeping duties. I pointed at the old suitcase and cloth satchel sitting in the street, by the front wall of the guest house. Didn't she know that they could have been rifled by any old vagrant or passer by? She snorted with contempt and offered the opinion that even the tramps wouldn't lower themselves to raking through such disheveled looking items. I caught myself before I called her a dried up grasping old skell and smiled serenely at her before asking why they were on the pavement rather than in my room. Ten minutes later I wished I had just let rip, for all the good my attempt at charm and diplomacy did me. It would seem she wanted my room for someone more important but used my early departure and failure to hand my key in as the perfect excuse to be rid of me. I had been rejected before, naturally, but there was something degrading and soul crushing about being considered unworthy of an attic room in the worst digs in town. It was still early, about 10.30 am and I was a little tired. An hour was spent wandering like a ghost through the town. The high street had a certain charm to it, as did the esplanade. I found myself edging towards the arcades on the seafront. I immediately regretted this as the baseball cap in the booth of the first one I arrived at gave me the eye the moment I stepped in. I went to a fruit machine and stuck some loose change in. I felt a prescence behind me almost immediately and turned to see the guy leaning on a support pillar and staring at me like he wanted to disembowel me. I almost asked if I knew his daughter, but thought better of it for the second time in as many hours. It was definitely a good idea this time. He followed me to the door in silence and was still standing there as I turned off the main drag and headed up the nearest side street. The hunt for new lodgings would begin in earnest later in the day but I wanted away from the seemingly strange inhabitants of this town, for a while at least. A small 'private garden' with it's gate unlocked(therefore only private in the loosest of senses) presented itself to me as I walked aimlessly and with increasing fatigue. A nearby wooden bench beckoned and my weary legs collapsed towards it. I sat and relaxed unmolested for what seemed like the first time in an eternity.

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home Pt2

The beer in the bottom of the glass had barely settled from the swirling motion he had been making absently for the past five minutes when he raised the glass to his lips and swallowed the flat, foamy liquid. The woman to his left looked hopefully at him, her coke glass long since drained, the lemon slice looking ugly and dirty in the fingerprint and lipstick smeared glass. 'We for the off?' she said more in hope than expectation. She felt like a bored child pulling at it's parents coatsleeves. 'One more' he said flatly, almost with a belch. She would have gone long ago but he'd promised her 'a night'. He always did on a saturday. The cinema maybe? A nice restaurant? Even a walk in the park and a go on the swings................. The pub actually. She knew where this was leading though. Drag the late afternoon hours in the bar, dividing his time between her and the pool table. He'd then take her through to the lounge bar for some perfectly palatable but supremely dull fish and chips before returning from his ordeal to meet his mates. He usually never bothered to come back from the pool table by this point. That was her 'night' She didn't drink. Didn't like the taste of the stuff. On one occassion she had consumed several Baileys but found the sensation it induced in her deeply unpleasant. How she had landed up with a congenital pisshead she couldn't quite fathom. Sods law probably covered it....... It was about seven o'clock and she was now on the station platform. She had gone to look at the trains. She always seemed to end up looking at the trains. It was a terminus station and she always liked to watch the people boarding and disembarking, coming from the world and going back to it, the deisels rumbling and hissing, the guards whistle, the way the train seemed to take forever to disappear from sight on departure. It was only one train an hour but she was rarely pushed for time. Somewhere to the north and west was the rest of the world. Every time she sat on the platform, the same thoughts rushed through her head. Thoughts of escape. The city, another county..................hell, another country even. It wasn't like she was trapped as such, but she had been a definite case of arrested development in a variety of ways. All she had was her man and a small rented flat and a job in the post office. More than enough for some she supposed but little more than small town status symbols in reality. She was beginning to see why the station always seemed to 'suggest itself' in her wanderings.............. The 7.30 pulled in beside her and snapped her out of her thoughts. By the time she had gained full control of herself she was on the train and the doors were shut. She was perfectly calm. What could possibly happen? It was a train, it was going somewhere and it would take her back eventually. It would probably take her back that night but the spell had been broken.............

Wake Me Up When It's Time To Go Home

The wind whipped between my legs as I sat on the slightly damp grass of the little outcrop, giving me the irrational sense of being less secure than I really was. I had scuttled and scrambled onto it like a drunk man making his way from lamp post to lamp post at closing time on a saturday night. Having made it this far I wasn't about to go back just because I didn't have a tartan rug to park my arse on. It was 8AM, the sky was indecently blue and the water shimmered in the sunlight as it was contractually obliged to on these 'perfect' late spring mornings. The lodgings had been a great disappointment and the landlady an indifferent and offhand woman who made no attempt to disguise her discontent towards the world and her boredom at seeing yet another slate faced city dweller alight on her front porch looking for a room late in the day. I wasn't really in a position to complain or even blame her. I had taken her last room, a tiny, slightly damp attic room that looked like it had been converted for human habitation only recently and in rather an ad-hoc manner too if I may say...... I slept fitfully and woke at 6.30. I decided to make a break for it, bodyswerving breakfast and the inevitable and demeaning 'chuck out'. The local cafe was open and I parted with a little loose change in exchange for some ham rolls and a cup of tea. I was still gripped by the compulsion to move though, that old city vice............ An hour later I was as far east as it was possible to get on this particular part of the world and listening to the sound of life, albeit life detatched from everything I knew, getting out of second gear and getting ready to go about it's day. ...........and it reminded me of everything I hated, everything I had run from. It reminded me of people and places I had hoped to erase from my memory forever. A fool, escaping from something that can't be escaped from. I second guessed myself and decided not to have a look over the edge of the cliff. I laid back on the ever drying grass and hoped to catch a lethal dose of sunburn instead.

More Stuff

The Chicken Of Depression Has Alighted On My Window-sill

Ok, maybe a little melodramatic, but i've been in better moods................The wonderful world of myspace has me running to stick my head in a hole. It's maybe too early to say but I don't think it likes me.................... Anyway, enough self pity. Enjoy my fucking pictures.

I Always Thought Helensborough Was A Shithole Until I Took The Trouble To Visit The Place

Not usually one for dedications of any sort, but these are for the Japanese couple who asked me to take their photo on Helensborough prom and who delighted in the prescence of the assembled swans. I hope you enjoyed your day on the Clyde Riviera and only wish I'd had the prescence of mind to ask you to pose for a photo in turn..... Just a reminder to anyone floating through that A Mischief Of Magpies, the blog I occassionally contribute to has it's latest Blog Of The Week poll up. Three worthy candidates who deserve the once over and your valuable vote. Have a look and vote away.

Bloody Meme's

I've been tagged by Billy. Ok, Seven Things You Didn't Know About Me............ 1-Roughly once a month I set my alarm for half past eight, which should ensure that I arrive at work by 10am. My excuses are accepted mainly because they need my arse for all the shite they can't be bothered doing themselves. I'm thinking of upping this to once a fortnight. 2-I have one superstition. It involves going round the right hand side of a pole on a street corner where I live, even though it's easier to go to it's left. 3-I have more porn than is healthy for a man my age. 4-I have three seperate internet identities. None of them involve my real name. 5-I am allergic to soap opera's 6-I miss my cat Sam more than I ever thought I would. I was blind drunk the night he was put down. 7-I'm a complete and utter lush. 8-I've revealed more than I had intended and now i'll have kill you all................. For their sins I will now be tagging Clairwil, Jules and Pam Cheers!

Helensburgh

Keep an eye on The Gyp. I'll be chucking up some more photos and a short piece regarding the afternoon jaunt down the Clyde I took on the May 1st bank holiday.

Filler Alert!!!

Wrecked Boats, Bowling Quiet one tonight. Found this old favourite in my bookmarks. Kittens In Flat Caps More here. Check out the sidebar at rathergood.com for older, funnier and less cumbersome-to-download stuff. Cheers!

At Last............I'm A MySpace Bitch

Found the email that seems to have fully activated the myspace account I set up. Still not convinced, but if anyone wants to pop in and befriend me, the link is here and also at the bottom of my side-bar. Caught the end of what looks to have been a rather interesting interview with Diego Maradona. Gary Lineker, a Spanish speaker after his time at Barcelona interviews the revitalised Argentinian footballing genius, now back to his wiry, muscular best after years of cocaine abuse and binge eating. He's back to good health now and looks not a million miles away from the short arsed, tank-like little maestro that broke many a Belgian, English and German heart at the 1986 World Cup in Mexico. He also has a TV show which looks like the sort of thing that most of us would sell our nearest and dearest to see on saturday night prime time. Instead we get fucking D-list celebs falling on their arses in some half baked dancing/reality/gameshow format. Oh, and he's a chum of Fidel Castro. Quite where his affection for that old war dog comes from I don't know, but it seems fairly genuine. Didn't he do his recovery in Cuba at Castro's invitation? Can't remember now. I guess Castro also retains a cult following amongst South Americans in general, going by the amount of countries in the continent voting in Socialist governments these days. I believe there may be more to follow..................

Oh God! Not Him Again...............

David 'Diddy' Blaine I hope the dreary cunt drowns, naturally.............. I'm all for people cheating death, but Blaine is such a bore. He's a fucking magician, it's a fucking trick, he'll walk away from it and all the simpletons will think he's fucking Jesus or something. He's not even Ali Frigging Bongo. Bah!

Mayday on May Day*

*Sorry! I desperately don't want to spend half of tomorrow in my scratcher. Really, I don't. That said I have no idea what to do with myself if I do get out of bed before 10am. Any suggestions or recommendations should be left in my comments box. If none are forthcoming I have a backup plan to get a train to......................somewhere. Of course, it'll probably piss down giving me the perfect excuse to pull the covers back over my head and fuck off back to sleep. Could be worse, I could be a snooker fan. I wouldn't be able to leave the house all weekend for fear of missing out on this.