Avoid Christmas Disappointment & Stay In Bed

It's that time of year folks. The time of year when you start to do the 'heating's coming on dance'. Usually around about 5.45pm. Not long after the frostbite has set in, which of course makes dancing a tad difficult. Ventured out tonight in the freezing fog to get some messages. I did consider going back out again with the camera to get some moody fog pics, but I wasn't for doing anything until I regained the feeling in my fingers and legs, by which time I'd decided I'd rather set fire to my armpits than go back outside again. Of course, a good old cold snap is no bad thing, if only to freeze snot nosed, paranoid, mentally deficient wanker students to the pavement as they queue ACROSS the pavement to get their money from cashpoint machines. The result is the sight, all across town, of absolute fucking morons causing a major obstruction to passers by in the name of the confused notion that just because someone is behind you,they can't see your pin. Fucking hell!! It happened to me the other night and it was frankly embarrassing to have to join in with this 'dance of the retards'. I could see people joining the queue and thinking the same as me. NOBODY CAN SEE YOUR PIN IF YOU COVER THE KEYPAD!!!!!!! If someone is too close for comfort, simply fucking turn and stare at them, as I did a few weeks ago to some toolbag outside Sainsbury's. It ain't fucking difficult. In fact, it's rather satisfying and empowering. Just watch them sheepishly step back and out of your face. Even the meekest of spoddy studes should be capable of such a feat, though if passive aggression is your general MO, then I have to admit that such activity may not be for you and queuing across across the pavement must seem pretty natural........

Built To Spill - Nowhere Nothin' Fuck-Up

Not my favourite BTS song, but the best one I have to hand. Still better than most stuff you'll ever hear.

Blue Thunder

Galaxie 500 - Plastic Bird I always found that it was best to listen to Galaxie 500 from another room. Dean Wareham's voice has that nagging, abrasive quality that sounds better the further away you get from it. Of course, as you retreat from the speakers, the songs open up and reveal themselves to be lovely discordant pop gems on the sly. (Or shoegazing shite, depending on where you stand on these issues.....................) No more 'Winter Warmer' rubbish. I can't be arsed. There will however be Christmas themed run in mid December. Cheers!

Unsent Letters From A Dead Man Pt2a

The taxi eventually arrived and we left the night and the 3am chill of the city centre behind us. I sank down into my seat as Elaine gave the driver our destination, then she sank back with me, her head dropping to nestle on my shoulder. After a few minutes, I felt her lips and warm breath tracking up and down and from side to side on my neck, starting work on me again . I pulled away slightly and looked at her apologetically. "Easy there missus!" "Aw! I thought you liked that." she said, looking slightly baffled. "I do, it's just........" I trailed off and looked out the window. After a few seconds I turned to look at her again with nothing more than a shrug and a sigh. "I understand. Not here" she said with a nod. "Look, it's ok Jim. Just relax, we've got all night....." With that she put her head back on my shoulder, and stared ahead, as our Turkish taxi driver sped through south side streets that were almost totally unfamiliar to me. He said nothing, save for an inquiry about whether we should turn left or right at one point, but beyond that he gave nothing away. Good for him, not enough taxi drivers had their verbal diarrhoea in such good check. "So, how far now?" I asked her absently. "Five minutes pet" she replied, squeezing me reassuringly. I felt a strange mixture of comfort and embarrassment at her response. I hadn't been called 'pet' since I was about seven years old, yet there was something about the dream-like chaos of the past two hours that had set me a little on edge and her serenity was beginning to put me a little more at ease. I squeezed her back and I stared dead ahead into those green-blue eyes. We slowly and discreetly fell into each other and all remaining memories, tension, and bad karma I had been carrying started to drift away into the aether. The cab crested a rise in the road and Elaine broke away, sat forward and pointed out to the driver where she wanted us dropped off. We fished about for cash to pay the cabbie, then clambered out onto the damp streets of Rutherglen. I only had a the vaguest idea of where we were in relation to any place I knew. I recognised nothing of my surroundings as we walked to Elaine's flat and I concluded that I had left any sense of direction I possessed behind me, somewhere at the bottom of Union Street. I didn't mind. Where I was going, I wouldn't need it.

Unsent Letters From A Dead Man Pt1

"Don't let her kiss you."

"Sorry?"

"Don't let her kiss you!!"

"Why not?"

Karen looked at me like a mother telling her son why he shouldn't stick a screwdriver in an electrical socket.

"Just don't. She'll have you for breakfast."

"Breakfast is an important meal" I said, before smugly turning to look out the window of the bus.

"Yeah, but you've got no idea who she has lined up for lunch and dinner."

"Oh c'mon........... I'm a big boy. Besides, who says she's that interested in me. She seems like a decent sort. Funny, clever, unconventional. Not my sort at all.............."

"If I was a bloke, I'd go for her" she said absently.

I raised an eyebrow and turned the other way, staring at an Asian woman trying to get her buggy and children down the stairs from the top deck and off the bus, a queue of impatient, uptight citizens silently cursing in her wake. I stared at the floor and counted cigarette butts, then looked up again.

"Makes you a lezzer then" I said, not quite as under my breath as I had intended.

The force of her hand on the back of my head took me by surprise and my forehead took a whack against the steel bar that constituted the back of the seat in front. I stared daggers at her as she took her turn to look smugly out of the window.

"Violence is most unbecoming of a lady" I said weakly

"Tell it to a lady then, you little tit!"

My stop arrived soon after and I got up to leave in silence. Karen gave me the finger and a placid smile as I descended the stairs.

Her way of telling me to 'take care'.

It was much appreciated.

North Berwick

Shots from Friday. Thanks to the folks for having me, a fine day all told, especially for mid November.

Isle of May

"I think Youtube will replace television" opined some twat the other day. Yeah, maybe, but only if they manage to improve the picture quality, speed up the buffering and remove the comments of about half a million mental defectives. The comments on Youtube, as you all probably know, are beyond belief. The relative articulacy and lucidity found on blog comments make you realise just what a sweet little cotton wool world we live in over here. Youtube comments are like some hellish leftover from the days when message boards didn't require logins and people just changed their name when they got banned.

Points Of View it ain't.

Has anyone seen Points Of View recently? Is Barry Took still doing it?

I do know that instead of stills of the original letter and a suitable voice-over, we now have phone recordings of irate/elated viewers waxing pedantic/lyrical about something they saw a fortnight ago. Or are they phone recordings? Is it all some big con? Are the voiceover artists of yesteryear simply re-employed to work from home and ring up the BBC, read out the e-mailed complaints/compliments and put on the odd Geordie/Brummie/Scouse accent to lend it all a veneer of credibility?

I hope so..............

From The Mouths Of Muppets

"Oh, I'm so glad he got in! , he really deserves it..." "Did you know the White House was built by black slaves?" "Was it? That's terrible! They should tear it down and build it again!" I kid ye not, that was part of an actual conversation overheard in the dining area at work. Well meaning and kind hearted gibberish, of course, but I wasn't about to get involved in the conversation, so I quickly left the room before I burst into a fit of giggles. It's that whole "Aw, isn't it great?, he's so brave!" bullshit. People acting like the guy's a nine year old paraplegic who's just won his first swimming badge. Wonder what the reaction will be when he gets down to business and displays more of the 'tough bastard' side needed to govern any sizeable country. Maybe I'm not entirely comfortable with politicians unless they register somewhere on the Cunt-O-Meter. ** It'll come..... In other news, I think I may be a tad lovesick. Or something like that. Not for anyone in particular, you understand, but the symptoms have been manifesting themselves ever more clearly for the past month or two. That inescapable feeling that you're spending too much time on your own and that something vast and important is missing from your existence. Or maybe I just need to buy more porn............. ("~) I believe it's what Kinky Friedman describes as 'Spiritual Horniness'. Winter Warmer No4

Bauchredner by Gastr Del Sol, from the Camoufleur album

**paragraph edited.

You Fucking Liar!

Came home last night to find someone had set the back court on fire. A vast improvement if you ask me...........

Apparently we're all gagging for ID cards. Has Jacqui Smith been in at the booze cabinet ? Seriously, there are two possibilities here. She's either been canvassing the opinions of twelve year olds, or the people she claims to have been accosted by, the ones telling her they can't wait to get retina scans and have their private information left on public transport, are mere figments of her imagination.

On a less peevish note, my latest Photoblog concluded yesterday. Seasons1: Autumn can now be viewed in all it's modest glory.

Ok, I'm off to put a pillow over my head and bellow every last ounce of rage out of my body. It's the only rational response to your internet connection dying on you once an hour.

Winter Warmer No3 The Handsome Family:- The Giant of Illinois

Hello, My Name Is Barack Obama...........

...............I am the inheritor of Dubya's kingdom of doom, and all I can say is..........

I'm FUCKED!!

Aha!, no, just kidding.....

Anyway, when I heard that The iLL Man had the great Mike Love of the Beach Boys guest blogging for him, I took the liberty of asking to grace his blog on the day I got elected, if I indeed that was what transpired. He wasn't sure at first, claiming he had Jeremy Clarkson, Joe Pasquali and the bass player from Level 42 lined up as possibilities for that particular week. Being at the back of that particular queue of celebs, I felt for sure I'd miss out, but he eventually relented and told me that I "had better fucking win" or he'd set Cliff Richard on me. A terrifying prospect. I'm already sick to my stomach at the thought that Fleetwood Mac might re-form again to play at my inauguration.

So here I am, and it feels great to be elected. One thing I need to say to everyone. Can you all come down from the rafters soon? Please? It's fucking scary. Every man, woman, child and family pet, the world over, seems to be treating me like the 2nd coming.

Maybe this is why I'm FUCKED!

How many of you will hate my guts in four years time?

Ah, I don't care. I'm the first US President to post on the iLL Man's blog. Beat that Bush! This weeks celebrity endorsement comes via the 44th President of The United States of America, Barack Obama.