Bob Hoskins

Bob Hoskins

The best

Was

Pennies from Heaven

But who can go

Wrong

With a Denis Potter Play?

I wasn't so keen on The Long Good

Friday

Where you weren't believable

As any sort of gangster

But

Still miles more believable

Than that twat that plays

Charlie

In Casualty

Roger Rabbit

What

Was that like?

Co-starring with an animated

Rabbit

Is a female rabbit called a rabbit?

I've not seen the Super

Mario

Film nor much of your

Later work, but I'll always

Remember

You as the sheet music

Salesman in Pennies from

Heaven

With the Brylcream hair, and

The sharp suit, and the

Frigid

Wife and the oddball girlfriend

Singing and dancing at the drop of a

Hat

Providing bizarre musical interludes

You were a short man

All

Too short

And gone...

Neighbours (UK)

NEIGHBOURS (UK)

The Cameron's bedroom. David is looking out of the window.

SAMANTHA: David. Relax. Come to bed.

CAMERON: I can't. What with those neighbours, and UKIP.

SAMANTHA: [Laughing] UKIP.

CAMERON: I fail to see what's funny about...

SAMANTHA: You can't kip because of UKIP. Heh!

CAMERON: Oh. Really. Hilarious.

SAMANTHA: But who needs all that silly old...

CAMERON: Me. That's who needs it. I need to lead the nation into...

SAMANTHA: The eighteenth century?

CAMERON: That's right! The...no. The recovery, the future...

SAMANTHA: Fat chance of recovery with George next door at number eleven. Fat-cat recovery, more like.

CAMERON: Oh no. What's he doing now?

SAMANTHA: Who? Wayne-oh?

CAMERON: Wayne-oh? Jesus...

SAMANTHA: Yeah, he's Wayne-oh. To his mates, like. I'm Samster...

CAMERON: 'Sanster'...

SAMANTHA: Yeah. Like 'hamster' but with a...

CAMERON: OK. Thanks. I get it...

He heads to the door.

SAMANTHA: Where're you going?

CAMERON: Downstairs. I need to think.

SAMANTHA: Well, remember we're over Wayne-oh's place tomorrow for beers and...

CAMERON: [Pulls a face of disgust] Beers?

SAMANTHA: Yeah. It's Chiff's birthday.

CAMERON: Who?

SAMANTHA: Chiffon. Wayne-oh's neice.

CAMERON: Dear god. [He slams the door on the way out].

April Prince of Darkness Special

April Prince of Darkness Special

Peter Mandelson enters his palatial home, wearing football kit. In that giveaway to all real players, everything is just too new, pristine, and identifies him as a fraud.

MANDY: Terry...TERRY...TERRY!!! Really, Terry, where are you?

Enter Terry. He is wearing shorts and flip flops, and is polishing a glass A cigarette dangles from his lips.

MANDY: [Pointing to the cigarette] Really, Terry. What did I say about passive smoking, and my body being a temple?

TERRY: [Coughs] Oh, yeah. [He drops the cigarette into the glass and puts the glass on the coffee table] where've you been, boss?

MANDY: I, Terry, have been playing in the midweek Westminster five-a-side league.

TERRY: Oh.

MANDY: And, Terry, how can you enjoy this football thing? I'm covered in bruises. Some thug, I'm sure he's about to defect to UKIP, tripped me over and I've skinned my knee...look...

TERRY: Where?

MANDY: Here...

TERRY: [Peering closer, just millimetres away] Nope, not seeing it...

MANDY: Really, Terry. Well, I won't be doing that again.

TERRY: What I don't get, boss, is what possessed you to do it in the first place. You've had some daft ideas over the years, but...

MANDY: It was Ed, he's not connecting with the ordinary folk...

TERRY: Ordinary?

MANDY: Yes, you know. The man in the street, White van. Rolled up tabloid in his back pocket. Rolling his own. Supping a pint chewing the prok scratchings over the latest events in the madcap world of the premiership football cup...

TERRY: Boss...

MANDY: What?

TERRY: Forget it, boss.

MANDY: Forget it? Whyever...

TERRY: Because, boss, you're coming across as a prize numpty trying to be something, plainly, you 'aint...

MANDY: But...Terry...[His bottom lip starts to curl, and his eyes are visibly welling up]...I've bought shorts and socks and the whole uniform...

TERRY: Kit.

MANDY: Eh?

TERRY: Kit. Not uniform. Kit. See? You can't pull the wool...

MANDY: And I've been practising my dressing room banter...

TERRY: Changing room...

MANDY: What? Where?

TERRY: It's changing room. Dressing room, theatre, changing room, sport facility...

MANDY: Well, if you're going to split hairs, I'm off to watch Norwich United on the...

TERRY: City.

MANDY: City?

TERRY: City...

MANDY: With Delia and Stephen (National Treasure) Fry, and...

TERRY: City.

MANDY: [Throws down the football he had under his arm] Why must you spoil everything, Terry, I hate you!

Mandelson, Prince of Darkness, storms off upstairs, crying profusely.

TERRY: [Singing] Don't know who you are, don't know who you are, new labour project, you don't know who you are...

Hey fat boy, wat'cha doin' uptown?

Parking two buses

Apparently, Chelsea went to Anfield and parked two buses.

I wonder...

where they got...

the idea from?

After playing five-a-side, it must be national fat bloke football week.

Get me my medication, there's a dear

You should cut down on your pork-life, mate...

...get some exercise.

I had a great time running (well, walking) around playing five-a-side. The problem was, is, time. About thirty years of it. As BLISS pointed out when I got back (twenty minute drive, twenty minutes getting out of the car, twenty minutes getting to the door and up the front steps):

“They're all less than half your age...”

Thanks.

“In fact, you're more than double their age...”

No, really, thanks.

“There's people over thirty years old who have...”

Enough, already.

My body was making me fully aware of the age difference. By hurting. A lot. If not all of it, then somewhere between 95% and all of it. The price, I suppose, of not playing indoor cricket this winter (apart from the last two games when player shortages were acute) and not having any pre-season nets (sportshall, roof leak, damage to the floor, insurers moving slowly).

I was, actually and sadly, a bit nervous, not having kicked a ball, apart from retrieving it for a throw-in when watching (and then only when the clock was ticking and we needed it back in play quickly). I got a bit of grief one season watching MM's lot play. We were holding out for the win, one goal ahead, the ball went out for a throw, and, like any sensible bloke would, I ignored it. Up to them to get the ball, they're the ones in a rush.

“Thanks mate” their player said (the collective noun for a footballer losing by the odd goal with the clock ticking down is a 'disgruntle') “very christian”.

“Don't mention it” I said, “I don't believe in all that. I like winning.”

Yeah, I was nervous. The last time I'd played with these guys, they were big and strong, some of them very big and strong, but I was a lot younger, still (just about) playing myself, and they were fifteen and sixteen years old. Would I get a touch of the ball at all? Would something give out? Go terminally ping leaving me with an embarrassing trip to A&E? Would I have to nip off to chuck up?

It goes through the mind, all that stuff.

Anyway, without a doubt, they took it easy on me, although I'd never admit that (ooops), and I lived, not only to tell the tale, but to bore anyone willing to listen senseless with it. I did concentrate my efforts on providing a forward outlet to our more defensive (and more mobile players) by staying advanced, and central (sometimes known as “goal-hanging” to the less tactically aware). Despite not doing too much, movement-wise, I was dripping by the end of the hour.

When they decided to go for a beer instead of a curry afterwards, I called it a day. There's only so much style-cramping the poor guys can stand, after all, and I needed to get home. To a super-hot shower, painkillers and cotton-wool wrapping.

The best thing is that there's still quite a few of them that have maintained their enthusiasm for the game and are still regularly playing it. That makes me happy.

Letter to the Arsenal

How to get better results

Dear Arsenal,

Here's some ideas that might help next season:

1. Get at least one psycho. Not some idiot who runs around kicking people, but a real player who will not stand for an iota of nonsense from anyone. Then use him as a role model and instead of players and manager standing there with arms outstretched berating the officials, start giving it “plenty more where that came from, sonny”. If a referee won't look after us, then we'll look after ourselves.

2. We do not concede from a move starting with an opponents' foul. If there's any question that they've got away with one, we nip things in the bud with a foul of our own. The nastier the better.

3. Street smarts: know your enemy, target weaknesses and let them know we look after our own, for example, the next time we play Liverpool:

1. Agger crocked Wilshire in an international. I don't care that is was an international, that it may have been a genuine accident, that Agger is “not that sort of player”, the first chance we get, Agger's writhing on the floor in agony and someone's in his ear warning him about who he crocks playing for his country.
2. Gerrard had a go back at Wilshire after Jack gave him bit of a thump. Someone needs to take revenge for the revenge, with a huge bonus of super-added revenge.
3. Suarez can be wound up. Foul him, repeatedly and early and near the halfway line and surround the referee demanding bookings for diving every time. He'll soon crack and bite someone.
4. Flanagen loves piling into a challenge. Instead of jumping over his tackles or going down clutching an ankle, wait a fraction of a second and then launch in, too. He'll be thinking twice from that point onwards.

4. Have a similar 'black book' for every team we play and use it to the maximum.

5. Replace Sagna (it seems inevitable that he's going, sadly) with an equally determined and robust full back, one of those that think they're six foot four and therefore entitled to win every ball in the air as well as on the deck. Preferably with some psycho tendencies. See Zabaleta at City and the Chelsea bloke old racist bitey-chops at Liverpool likes taking chunks out of.

6. Someone tell Wenger it's not points per pound, just points that determine league positiions.

7. Someone tell Wenger that when he says, in an interview, that unless the financial fair play regulations come in with some effect we'll be disappointed, that just means that we'll be disappointed.

8. Someone tell Wenger that it's a beautiful game alright. It's beautiful all the time you're winning. Otherwise, there's little beauty to be beheld. Graeme Souness: show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser. Souness on how he'd've stopped Yaya Toure: I don't know. Not legally. Kolo begged us to sign Yaya, but we failed to do so.

9. Get one of the monsters playing upfront to realise that they're monsters and get them to start bullying opposing centre halves. Make them watch videos of Drogba bossing Senderos.

10. There's a move back to pace and power, away from possession football and tika-taka. How about we take this onboard before we're left behind. Better still, how about we get players with pace and power, and good feet and good technique? That'd get us ahead of 90% of the opposition.

Also, that Ivan bloke? We could do better for a quarter of the salary. We're paying civil service top management wages and getting a roadsweeper.

Yours,

Istvan

The Bridges of Southampton

Breakfast

Vegetarian for BLISS. New Forest for me. Perfectly poached egg. Hers were perfectly scrambled. Even the beans were right.

Mushrooms.

They're often the barometer of breakfast quality. When they've clearly not sat around at all, let alone too long, when they're spot on, usually the rest follows.

Unlimited toast, and no hanging about for it while everything else cools off – that's important too.

Cattle and horses

We had to stop and take photos of these longhorn cattle. Bovine Boris Johnson lookalikes, with great big horns, and foppish haircuts. Ponies, too, we got oads of photos of ponies. They're extremely photogenic when they're wandering about. Free. It's the freedom that's the difference. No fences, no pens. Just the occasional cattle-grid limiting their movements.

The noise of machinery

Our room was over the pool, and over the pool extract system. Then, when BLISS decided to get another hours kip in the morning, someone started Kango-ing out some concrete next door. It was uncanny. She shut her eyes, and less than a microsecond later the pneumatic drilling kicked off.

Then, when we stopped on the way home for quick walk, they were steamrollering the aggregate path on the other side of the road.

Were they following her around?

Southampton – find that bridge

We looked for a scenic bridge, which we were sure we could see in the distance. We found a short, concrete monstrosity they still had the cheek to charge us 60p to cross.

Can I take it to the bridge?

Nope. Not in Southampton. It's closed.

Thai lunch

How come the place was almost empty? A meal deal, a soulless sarnie, bag of crisps and fizzy water costs £3.50. For a tenner we had a starter and a main, bith hot, both delicious. BLISS had spring rolls and a yellow vegetable and tofu curry. I had the dim sum dumplings and a hot chicken curry.

DLL babysitting more than the dogs

DLL ended up babysitting my ridiculous mother as well as the dogs, via the police and social services. Why can't she just behave herself and stop causing stress and grief?

BLISS and DLL are nice, kind people, and they shouldn't have their patient natures taken advantage of in this way. It's a two-tier system. If we lived abroad or miles away, the services would be stuck with her, and they couldn't unload their work onto us.

New Forest - mind the gap

The New Forest

Thanks to Kiz's generosity, and thnaks to DLL agreeing to babysit the dogs, we're off to the New Forest, BLISS and me.

Emptying out the car

That means someone other than me in the car. That, in turn, means cleaning it out. How do you get two black bin bags' worth of rubbish in a Ford Focus?

Instantly, that's how.

It doesn't seem to accumulate slowly, the in-car debris. It's as if the minute I turn my back there's gremlins emptying bags of all sorts of stuff over the passenger seat, the back seat, the floor and the estate bit at the back.

Anyway. It got a clean out, and a spray with the air freshener, too.

BLISS brings her own music

She did let me listen to two Goon shows on the way there, but from that point onwards she took command of the CD player.

Lunch at the pub

I'm not, generally, a fan of pub grub. I usually find it overpriced and poor value.

Pleasantly surprised, then, to have a superb pub lunch. A short menu boded well. Instead of endless blackboards listing every dish known to man (and freezer), there was menu with about six mains and a specials list of two more. Good start. I had wild mushroom pasta and BLISS had a vegetable and bean chilli and rice. Mine was spot on. Perfectly cooked pasta, the right amount of sauce with a hit of salt and pepper, cream, garlic and white wine. Mushrooms that tasted of mushroom. BLISS was raving about hers. We got lucky there, without a doubt.

Not walking, sinking

I'm resigned to getting older, increasingly frail and doddery. No-one, but no-one told me that you also morph into Captain Mainwearing out of Dads' Army. We went for a walk. “Lets go up that hill there. That'll give us a great view.” I think I actually said something like “all we need to do is get across this wet bit here”.

The first two or three grassy clumps supported my (not inconsiderable) weight. The third or fourth one didn't and I disappeared up to the hip in sticky mud. BLISS had two thoughts: camera, and how to stop laughing, in case, like, it's actually a serious situation. I had two thoughts, too. One: how to get the left leg out of the quick-mud without shedding the trainer, never to be seen again. Two: zip up the pockets, fast, to protect the valuable stuff, the camera and wallet.

I emerged, to further hilarity. We continued the walk, and we passed the sign on the other side of the quick-mud. “Danger, unsafe ground, do not pass” it said. There was no twin sign on the other side, the side we'd approached it from.

Apparently, there's little funnier than the step by step squelch from a mud-filled training shoe. The shower was interesting. I'm not good at hand-washing clothes.

Then...

...we went into Burley (I was just covered in dry mud by then, almost presentable), had a swim and a sauna and another superb meal (somehow we managed to cram in three courses, all delicious).

Something smells Westminster way

A deep and entrenched sickness

When people died at Hillsborough, the reaction from the government and the police, from the very top down, was to cover up, to paint a picture of drunken, badly-behaved football fans. The architects of their own downfall. Good riddance, the powers that are supposed to look after us seemed to say.

Thatcher didn't get sport, not at all, and didn't get football in particular.

Anyone who thinks her son Tone was any different need only look at him recalling the minister for sport from the Rugby World Cup because there was a tight vote in the commons. Anyone who falls for the trumpeting and triumphalism surrounding the olympics is living in cloud cuckoo land. The unholy alliance doesn't do sport either. Will the prime minister be where he should be on Cup Final Day? Not a chance.

Thatcher, and this is my theory, mine alone, but I have a marrow-deep conviction I'm at least on the right lines, craved absolute power, and therefore did everything she could to do down big, strong, genuinely powerful (as in physically powerful) men:

• She assembled a cabinet of ultra-wet, limp specialists in arse-kissing.
• She went after the miners with everything she had.
• She started the rot of prime ministers not attending the cup final, a given until the years of her misrule.

She ordered the Hillsborough cover up, and the police, her very own private army, complied. They changed statements. The courts decided to impose an arbitrary cut-off time on their initial investigation and reports.

For the avoidance of doubt, just in case anyone's under the misconception that things have changed for the better:

• The Wikipedia page on Hillsborough has been changed. The words “Blame Liverpool Fans” have been added. “You'll never walk alone” has been changed to “You'll never walk again”. The changes have been made from a government computer. A computer in the department for culture, media and sport, the treasury, or the office of the solicitor general.

• “This is Anfield” has been changed to “this is a shithole”. (Actually, changed to “This is a shit hole”, so not only are these government bods evil and twisted, they can't spell and lack the balls to override the spellchecker.

• The Bill Shankley entry has also been changed.

Like my Thatcher / power theory, this is just me speculating, and making a prediction on that basis:

A “thorough investigation” will be undertaken.

Some junior personnel will be scapegoated and disciplined.

Or they'll be disciplined for leaving their computers unprotected and open to abuse by others.

Or they'll wait and hope the whole thing blows over.

We'll still be governed by buck toothed inbred public school educated out of touch self-servers who don't get the national game, and therefore don't get the national psyche, and therefore may as well try to relate to an alien from the planet Zog as the peasants they love bossing around.

The Red Card

A true story:

Saturday afternoon. That means, or used to mean, playing football in the winter months. We're engaged in what'd be described as bit of a tussle. Two physical teams. Them, because they only ever do physical. Us because or spine is ageing. Two centre halves in our forties. Central midfield and striker also late thirties /early forties. Too old for this.

Out runs the referee. All too brand new. Creases in the sleeves of his black shirt. In his socks too, probably, until they stretched over his chubby little legs ('aint I a bitch?). Gary Glitter bouffant hair-do. Posh voice. Sorry mate, you're going to struggle around here. The bloke I'm marking and me think the same thing at the same time:

“Better shout for everything, early and loud, because this clown's never kicked a ball in his life...”

Anyway, he's not all that bad, just easily led, and I'm not too bad at leading the easily led. He wasn't biased, just useless.

In the second half, I sliced the ball out for a throw in and gave myself bit of a foul-mouthed going-over for being so rubbish. He ran straight over, Mr Glitter, and brandished a red card.

“I”, he asserted, “am not a ****er”.

“No, mate”, I said, “you're a stupid, deaf, ****er. Thanks.”

Sunday morning. MM runs out of the changing rooms with the under whatevers I was running at the time. Followed by...

...Gary Glitter in his second pristine ref's outfit of the weekend. Their first attack and MM brings down their centre forward (who was playing for us the next season) and the ref points to the penalty spot, and the headlines are flashing through my head:

Father and Son Sent off by Same Referee in one Weekend.

Luckily, from somewhere, he was hit by a bolt of common sense and just gave the penalty and MM a ticking off. He didn't recognise me on the touchline, either, making him a deaf, stupid, blind ****er.

I like Morrissey...

...and I like him having a go at the Canadians and their barbaric seal cull.

The Independent, belying its name, has called Morrissey's views a “rant” and a “tirade” and says:

“You can expect more or Morrissey's theatrical and miserly views on the planet when he releases his forthcoming album, World Peace is None of Your Business, in July.”

Since when did the Independent become the Mail? The paper quotes the Canadian fisheries minister as if she's the fount of all knowledge, unquestioningly and endorses her opinion that Morrissey has been 'brainwashed' by 'fringe animal rights groups' and 'radical environmentalists'.

Gail Shea, her name is.

This isn't an endearing or popular standpoint, but it's the only one I have:

Baseball bat.

Baby seal.

Gail's bawling, puking, smelly baby.

Pick one.

Look away...Gail.

Borderline?

Only Lovers Left Alive

I think DLL has bit of an action-film thing going on. “What actually happens in this?” she asked. The answer is, actually, quite a lot, but it isn't Blade. It's easy-paced, laconic, like the other Jim Jarmusch films I've seen. The couple at the centre of things have been lovers for centuries, as vampires are all but immortal. Co-stars include an almost deserted Detroit. There's some great, droll lines. The wild-child younger sister turns up, trashes the place, and drains their friend:

“You've drank Ian.”

“Yeah. And now I feel sick.”

“I'm not surprised. You knew he was in the music industry.”

Marlowe not only wrote Shakespeare's plays, but, being another vampire, is still around to discuss the finer details. After hundreds of years, naturally an interest in music means developing virtuoso skills and the ability to write original music, as well as a collection of vintage instruments.

The scenes are mainly indoor and pretty claustrophobic. Well, what do you expect when sunlight is a deadly enemy. When the cameras go outside, the almost deserted city of Detroit provides an eerie backdrop.

There's some great and frightening photos here:

http://content.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1882089,00.html

Someone's brother-in-law must have a fracking company

Or we're governed by idiots. Just when we need to look more and more at clean and renewable energy, just when we need to be focusing on real solutions and increasing the efficient use of the fossil fuels we burn, Cameron's looking to quietly pass a law allowing the fracking companies access to whatever underground areas they like, even if they're under your house or garden.

Just when we've had the wettest summer, and then the wettest winter since records began, just when sink holes are opening up all over the place, just as we start to realise that climate change's unexpected effects will include the tectonic, the volcanic, the extinction of species we depend on, they're looking to give freedom to do whatever they like, below ground, wherever they want to.

Unless the idea is to line their own pockets, the idea's absurd in the extreme. It's like deliberate sabotage or getting decisions wrong for the hell of it. It's inexplicable, and it's mad.

Borderline?

Talking of mad, the revenue's going to sell taxpayer details to commercial enterprises with an interest in the information.

One of their own described the idea as “borderline insane”.

Where's the 'borderline' come from?

Before anyone claims it's all super-safe, we received the details of a lady's problems with, and alleged debt to the DWP when disputing their claim against MM. The amount in question is minimal. Her name was vaguely similar to MM's. The way a banana is vaguely similar to a battleship.

Yeah. Trust's in short supply.

John Cooper Clarke

John Cooper Clarke

It was the first time I'd been to anything like it. Performance poetry, any sort of talk or reading, in fact. Luckily, AD is brilliant at recognising uselessness in others, shrugging his shoulders, and sorting out the tickets for the gigs. Luckier still, we secured a ticket for MM at a very nearly sold out show.

This was John Cooper Clarke and friends. He's got some pretty good mates. First on was Luke Wright. About a 75 / 25 split, stand-up and introductions / poems, he started with something like Fat Dandy, celebrating the larger man with a love of fine clothes. I liked The Bastard Of Bungay, every town and village has (at least) one of these whiskery old curmudgeons bemoaning the demise of everything they (and the Daily Mail) hold dear:

You’ve never seen such mobile jowls

or smelt such ripe productive bowels

and what the old boy does with vowels ….

The Glarston-berry Fustivowel?

Pow-pow with The Bastard of Bungay

Geoffrey Howe? Yes, very pleasant

I say, that’s truly corking pheasant

Ant and Dec? Contemptible peasants!

The present Bastard of Bungay

Then Mike Garry, more intense, not lacking humour, but happier with more obscure references, he referred to the balance of the evening, and he worked well between Wright and Cooper Clarke. Soldier Boy:

Boots scrape on Crumpsall cobbled streets

Inside the boots are fifteen year old feet

Khaki pants tight at the ankle

Grip and hold like a white slave manacled...

A caravan in the shopping centre

A man handing out leaflets showing boys on adventure

Smiling faces and glowing cheeks

But the leaflets are lies and the caravan man's a cheat...

And he'll send them off to some sun-drenched front

To fight a war that no one wants

A roadside bomb ends it all

Then home in a box to Lower Crumpsall

Then JohnCooper Clarke, much less harsh, much more whimsical than I'd anticipated. I suppose it's difficult to maintain an angry persona when you're the voice of M^cCain's Oven Chips. About 85% (white stage lights) stand-up / raconteur / old fashioned comedian (as in telling the audience jokes):

D'you know what? Any woman from this town who is faithful to her husband, boyfriend, or partner for five years actually gets a telegram from the Queen...does anyone know what it says?

[Pause]...

No, I didn't think so.

And 15% poems (dramatic change to coloured lights) he was simply great entertainment. Another arse-breather, he didn't stop for a moment, nothing apart from the occasional giggle interrupted the flow.

Frequently referring to the recently received honorary doctorate: “now I'm medical and everything”, and pleased with The Sopranos featuring Evidently Chickentown, like Madness, like HMHB, like Ladysmith Black Mambazo, the audience gets the benefit of all those years experience, knowing how to send people home happy.

Respecting the no (or not very much) bad language rule, here's a link to Evidently Chickentown:

http://johncooperclarke.com/?p=31

Us used in the Sporanos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2DShC4GhVc

Nuclear lies

Nuclear – it's the way forward

That's the fact. Or the fact according to those with something to gain from nuclear power getting massive funding.

For some reason the environmentalists and the Green Party don't make things clear:

• The statisticians and the economists in the employ of the pro-whatever lobbyists, if they don't like how certain costs colour the picture of what they're promoting, simply classify those costs as externalities.

• For example, the clean up and disposal costs of nuclear power are externalities, making it appear more cost-effective than it actually is.

• The fact that there's a chance of an accident or a melt-down with costs on a massive scale (it's happened before at a number of those Titanic-like failure-proof installations) is absolutely an externality. Even a 1% probability should bring some costs to the balance sheet.

• Predictably, disposal of the waste is another externality.

Now the Environment Agency has published an internal 'ooooops' document, identifying that the disposal site in Cumbria (a site dead near Selafield, how convenient (and low-cost) for transport and disposal) is maybe bit of a mistake, as it's prone to flooding.

With the risk of one million cubic metres of waste escaping.

The disposal method? It's very high tech, scientific and all that:

1. Lob it in a deep hole in the ground.

2. Pour on bulk concrete until there's no more hole.

3. Keep your fingers crossed.

4. Keep the documents about mistakes internal.

No, not what anyone really wants to hear, is it. But still, nuclear's the way forward. That's what us ordinary people are getting told by the great and the good with their degrees in history and law and politics (and anything other than environmental engineering or climate science) are telling us – who are we (the ordinary) to question the likes of the great Austin Mitchell?

Top news stories

Politics, the politicians say, is the new rock 'n' roll. Is it hell. In order of the number of hits, here's the top news stories from the online Guardian:

1. Everton v Utd (live).
2. Hull v Arsenal (as it happened).
3. Raheem Sterling's goals for Liverpool at Norwich.
4. Telescope big enough to identify alien life.
5. Drug scandal... (yes?) (no) ...at a major football club.
6. Chinese Grand Prix.
7. Ukraine crisis (yep, seventh on the list).
8. Danny Wellbeck considers his future at Utd.
9. The pagan roots of Easter (so, how come nowhere's bloody well open today?)
10. Marie le Pan / Farage row.

New rock 'n' roll? Two out of ten, at seven and ten at that.

An offensive number plate

Lady, you can have whatever you want, just don't be wantin' 8THEIST

New Jersey. A woman wanted the licence plate 8THEIST. The software rejected that. She tried BAPT1ST, and that was fine. The motor vehicle people gave the reason for refusal as being that 8THEIST (and also ATHE1ST) would be offensive and objectionable.

Better news is that the pope has said it's alright for me to carry on not believing, as long as I have a clear conscience.

Thanks dude!

I might respond, and reciprocate, because I think it's alright for him to be pope, if he wants, as long as he doesn't do that altar-boy rape thing they're a bit too fond of. In church circles. Maybe if he relaxes the condom versus the spread of AIDS in Africa thing, too. Perhaps he should hand back all that gold, silver and money they've accumulated over the years. Oh, yeah, and stop it with the bollocks: walking on water, virgin birth, biscuits and wine transubstantiating into the blood and flesh of christ, resurrection, eternal life after death, all that rubbish.

Also, I find it incredibly objectionable and offensive to have a so-called prime minister who believes in all that irrational buffoonery. So, yeah, if I'm kindly allowed to not believe in stuff that doesn't exist...but...then go ahead and do your thing...but...no fundamentalism, either, and definitely no witch drowning, inquisition torture, and no blowing things up or driving planes into things.

Right then, lets get all Henry Root (Google it – the Henry Root letters):

Dear Pope,

Thank you for your kind permission to not believe in the unsubstantiated, irrational, unbelievable stuff you hard-sell to the terminally gullible. That's really nice of you and I intend to take you up on the offer, cheers.

Yours,

Istvan

PS You need a wardrobe manager mate. That's a dress they're making you wear, and, yes, it's a very silly hat.

PPS That T*ttenh*m Hotspur song? Genius. Did you come up with that all by yourself?

PPPS Don't worry about changing the hat costing you a place in the “do bears crap in the woods” list. I heard one last night that's a perfect replacement for “do you want a cup of tea?” “does the pope wear a silly hat?”. It was “fancy a bacon buttie?” “does the pope have a balcony?”. Maybe not quite as funny, but it would get you out of the ridiculous headgear without much loss of face.

PPPPS Me, I'd bin the bejewelled slippers, and the curly stick. What's that all about. Does your tailor know what century it is?

Just in case...

...here's a link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_X9_9OLlr4

Second up is the touching ballad about Spuds and his holiness, and there's the one about winning the league at theirs in there too.

Jellyfish spines and transparency

39 Steps

The John Abercrombie Quartet. Guitar, piano, bass and drums. I like the simplicity of this sort of music. Being able to hear exactly what every instrument is doing. No smears or smudges, yet no hint of sparseness, either.

There's a picture of part of a football pitch on the cover, and most of the original song titles have connections to Hitchcock films. I'm sure there's explanations for both. It starts with Vertigo, a few notes by way of introduction, and then the quartet's swinging, and there's that amazing, lush, warm envelopment great music can bring.

The album sweeps you away, and then you're back, and everything's somehow better.

Cameron stung by jellyfish...

...the headline said. Feverishly, I was searching for the 'stung to death', the 'fatally stung', the 'deadly jellyfish'. Sadly, it was a routine jellyfish. A common or garden jellyfish. Austin Mitchell might describe it as an 'ordinary' jellyfish, and advise Miliband to get in the sea and do some mingling.

Steve Bell, a great cartoonist, has Cameron as a jellyfish, and later as a balloon and an inflated condom. Why? Because there's nothing in there.

He's a true TeflonMan.

Like Havermeyer in Catch 22 and Kilgore in Apocalypse Now, he's one of those destined to get through without so much as a scratch. Bell said that after listening to him for hours, there's nothing there, nothing at all. He wants to promote good stuff and clamp down on bad things, and solve the economic crisis and stop all that pesky flooding, and do it all transparently. But, as ever, nothing changes.

I had the misfortune to meet many politicians while in the fire brigade. Local Authority types, and those that put themselves forward to make decisions, to steer the future of the London Fire Brigade. They loved talking over us, shouting us down. These men and women who've never been crawling around a burning building on their bellies at three in the morning with their arse half alight, apparently knew more than we did. My reaction under these circumstances is always to walk off. I'm quite happy alone. I particularly don't need the company of those people who talk over one of our guys with a great anecdote or relevant observation with their nonsense (one was some sort of expert, I kid you not, on folding sheets in hospital laundries – how will to live sappingly boring is that?). Another gave us a tongue-lashing about how long his friend had had to wait for a water tender to arrive at his property. We exchanged winks and waited, let the idiot run his course, then let our most laconic guy act as spokesman: “this is the London Brigade?” The aggressive response was “and...”. “And...we don't have any water tenders.”

So it isn't anything personal, Dave. I'd celebrate a fatal jellyfish / politician interaction, like, generally.

MM's old mixtape...

Some nice surprises

MM emailed me, reminding me of a mix CD I'd made him, back when he was in primary school.

He sent me links to the songs he remembered me dumping onto a CD for him, but the links did carry clues as to the songs, so hitting them, one by one, produced a series of nice surprises.

Primal Scream: Rocks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3ZCZjhjguA&feature=youtu.be

I'll bet this was the opening song on the compilation.

Now, we have your full attention...

The Bluetones: Autophillia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5xtjJ37DCo&feature=youtu.be

But if she's rockin'

Don't come knockin'

For a while

Light of heart, easy feel, good humour song.

Miles Davis: Time After Time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OddHP8_Em7s&feature=youtu.be

No question, this is absolutely beautiful. Crisp, sparse, clear. Reggae beat guitar, keyboards, drums, and Miles' melancholy horn, carrying enough emotion for a lifetime.

Fantastic. A great way into Miles Davis and jazz for anyone with doubts.

Donald Byrd, Guru, Ronny Jordan: Time is moving on

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pdk5xa6CWsc&feature=youtu.be

Like Miles, Donald Byrd refused to stand still. He played jazz in a jazz era, moved through soul, even soft soul, and here, with Guru, and Ronny Jordan on guitar, there's live hip hop.

Roy Ayers: Running Away

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1zm1-HpW0A&feature=youtu.be#aid=P9r4sUb4HWI

There's about three songs harmonically superimposed here, vocally. There's a vibes solo, too. A beautiful, easy groove. Absolutely splendid.

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones: The impression that I get

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIGMUAMevH0&feature=youtu.be

Give it a listen. You'll be asking the question: how're these guys not huge? Ska – punk, they should be the American Madness. That's my opinion, anyway. Check out as many songs and albums as you like, these guys are all killer, no filler.

John Martyn: May you never

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQs6MvsPCXA&feature=youtu.be

Love is a lesson

To learn in our time

By some incredible quirk of fate, an old neighbour was a massive fan, and he dragged me to see John Martyn at the (honestly) Tolworth Leisure Centre. Late seventies or early eighties, and he was playing solo, with an array of effects pedals, drum machines and the like. It was a fantastic gig by a great, under valued and sadly missed artist.

Not the usual stuff on a junior schoolkid's personal stereo.

MM

MM

It was like this: we were playing the midweek T20 cricket league, and MM went out to bat. “We're short on Saturday, can you play?” we asked. “Nah. Modelling job, need the money.” When, eventually, he was out, and made his way up the hill to the changing rooms, Mr B O'S, Rich and I spontaneously burst into song and dance: I'm Too Sexy For My Shirt, with those Saturday Night Fever poses. Words amended to He's too sexy for...He laughed, and told us where to go.

A fond memory is batting hours with him to get a draw at Dymchurch. His unflappable approach. The way he trusts his protective gear.

MM is comfortable. Anywhere. The world's his comfort-zone. He can put down the copy of Camus or Beckett he's reading, and go straight into full-on rabid Arsenal fan mode, then switch back. One of his earliest birthdays involved a trip to the Arsenal shop, then the Tate Gallery.

He gives me music and film (particularly foreign and American offbeat) tips. I give him hot curries and lifts to and from the station.

He's played at Highbury, on that hallowed turf, and he's a far, far better player than I ever was, technically much more adept, better at reading the game, maintaining concentration and shape. He does not stop talking for ninety minutes (neither did I, but he makes sense). He's playing for the London Universities Representative side. That takes some doing.

One of the things I love the most is that effortless and complete dovetailing you get with a very few people. Without daily, weekly, or even rarer telephone or other exchanges, when you meet up, it's as if you've never been apart. That's how I find MM.

Random memories: after the day playing at Highbury, at the tube station “where's my grass” “eh?” “my grass” “that lump of mud in your goody-bag?” “yeah” “I threw it away”. We went back to the wastebin on the lamp post and retrieved the grass he'd pinched. It grew for years in a pot on his window sill. He's continued to leave stuff on trains, buses, and anywhere where stuff can be left. He single-handedly keeps the mobile phone manufacturers in business.

Those long, long showers. “How much longer is he going to be?” “I don't know but we're seconds away from a hosepipe ban.”

The ability to build a EU general food mountain on a small paper plate. Then consume it all, without gaining an ounce, ever.

Animal Collective. Biutiful. My Morning Jacket. HMHB.

Leaving for the prom. Discovering just how happy he was to grab centre-stage.

That “right – don't touch those (kitchen worktops) while I get the others” followed by (another) trip to casualty. That was after a run of black eyes: settee onto radiator fall, Kiz hit him in the face with a bucket. Climbing frame mishap.

Winning the sports day sprint. A free reading junior school session, among the Janet and John level storybooks, he and a friend were pouring over the Observer Sport magazine.

Just last week the ball was going out for a goal kick from our corner, and stuck in the mud. He sportingly ran over and put it out of play. “He don't get that from me” I said.

He was choking on a soft jelly in Fuerteventura. I had him upside-down, and was reaching for the blockage, but it just felt like tongue. Eventually I just had to take a chance and hook in a finger and pull.

I love his company, his manners, his humour, his passion, and his smile.

Those Carling adverts, where someone does something fantastic, misses perfection by a shade, and consequently is refused the pint as a due reward? Well, if Carling did sons, they'd never beat MM.

The Common People

Ed, don't bother, mate

Rent a flat above a shop

Cut your hair and get a job

Smoke some fags and play some pool

Pretend you never went to school

But still you'll never get it right

'Cause when you're laid in bed at night

Watching roaches climb the wall

If you called your dad he could stop it all, yeah

You'll never live like common people

You'll never do whatever common people do

You'll never fail like common people

You'll never watch your life slide out of view

And then dance and drink and screw

Because there's nothing else to do

Austin Mitchell is an MP. Another with a degree in history. Lacking, therefore, in technical knowledge, you'd at least expect him to be useful with his first language. So. He's advised Ed Miliband to “get out and mix with ordinary people more”, and in that context, the 'ordinary' means 'as oppossed to hob-nobbing with the great and the good of Westminster. In case there's any doubt, he's added: “[Miliband needs to] bring issues down to the level [of ordinary voters]”.

Well. Austin. Ed.

I'd like to help, but I'll probably be too busy listening to Pulp's Common People on my walkman while pushing my chicken-dipper-filled trolley around Iceland, before settling down in front of Britains Got Singing Hairdressers, so don't bother popping round for a slap-up dose of ordinariness, and don't strain yourself finding a way of expressing the issues that's dumbed-down enough for even the likes of me to understand. I'll not be bothering to vote, as I understand there's five more Karl Ove Knausgaard books to read, and I've a huge long list of other, better things to be doing than wasting time at a polling booth.

I hope that you'll understand why that 'ordinary' hasn't gone down so well, and I hope you'll understand my pigeon-holing you as 'self-important, deluded, pompous Westminster asses'.

Oh, Austin, no doubt I'm too dumbed down and ordinary to understand your expenses fiddling either. Ten grand's worth of 'error'.

MM mentioned a Bill Bailey line, which I think applies to all MPs. They're like those plastic bags you see hanging high up in trees. It's a puzzle as to how they got up there, but no-one can be bothered to do anything about it. It must be awful having to speak in words of one syllable so that we ordinary folk can understand, and having to boss us about, because, otherwise, there'd be war, famine, disease, and we'd probably be killing off the planet. Oh. That's exactly what we have got after thousands of years of political and god-botherer rule. Doing a great job guys. Sorry we're too ordinary to be of much assistance...

...or, maybe, it's time for you inept, swindling, nest-featherers with your degrees in what happened in the past to clear off and let us have a go at looking after ourselves.

He's bringing you into disrepute

No. I can't have this...

...really, I can't.

I know this is the quickest route to being branded an Eastern European cave-dweller, but, look:

Russia has a bloke who looks like he'd go bare-chested into the woods to wrestle himself a bear.

We have a bloke who looks like a total knob holding a tennis raquet, who rides out with the local hunt to murder foxes with the other inbred rich folk, and now has revealed the ultimate, the biggest ever no-no, that which shouldn't ever be seen in public, really, it makes me want to vomit (and I've done that once in over twenty six years – that's how bad it is)...

...Cameron has male, elbow to wrist, bingo-wings. See. Here.

He's eight years younger than me. I've checked. There's a whole lot wrong with me, but I 'aint got male-pattern bingo wings (not yet, anyway). I'm going to play the Polish card hard here. He's nothing to do with me, matey.

You lot need to do something about this, and fast, before laughing stock becomes your middle name (between united and kingdom). Go to the Guardian where the full picture reveals that he's not only rolled up his sleeves to reveal the forearm flab, but he's wearing shorts, and...get this...

His knees are bigger than his thighs!!!

There must be a case for doing him for bringing the nation into disrepute or something? Stand down, David, stand down now.

How can you be represented by an early onset elbow bingo-wing bloke with skinny-knee-the-widest-point legs?

No, not grindhouse movies

Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks – Enter the Slasher House

An album, not a grindhouse movie. A good one. Whereas Panda Bear updates the Wilson brothers' sweet harmonies, Tare's starting point is a bit further along, towards the 'way out' end of the psychedelic spectrum. This is more immediate and accessible than Pullhair Rubeye or Down There, resembling, I think, Animal Collective's Centipede Hertz. A bit lighter, sparser, clearly defined, perhaps.

A film from an Irvine Welsh story...

...what could there possibly be not to like?

I re-watched Trainspotting recently. That's a decent film. DLL and I have lined up another watch of Filth, having gone to the pictures to see it last year. That was good, too.

So to test the hypothesis I've now seen Ecstasy, another one worth a watch, and Acid House, which, although it boasts an Irvine Welsh screenplay, sort of answers the question. Potentially, quite a lot, unless it's the right Irvine Welsh story being filmed. The grim and the weird and the acid trip mind-swap work better on the page than on the screen.

I suppose Sunshine on Leith would've been more attractive with a Proclaimers soundtrack, and a Welsh screenplay.

Cycling, it's the new golf

That's what the bespoke bike maker on the radio said. UK bike frame manufacturing had all but died out. It still isn't huge, it doesn't churn out mass production numbers. However, a small number of artisans are building made to measure frames, mostly for middle aged men. “it's the new golf” he said.

Quite what a middle aged bloke can do on a made to measure bike that he can't do on something off the shelf at Halfords I'm struggling to imagine. Unless he's going that little bit faster because his wallet's considerably lighter.

Masters Golf

That course at Augusta is absolutely insane. It must be like putting on sloping, undulating billiard tables. Nowhere else can a professional golfer narrowly miss a short putt only to see the ball end up much further away from the hole than when he started.

It's a seriously beautiful looking golf course. But what a tough place to play a game that's difficult enough in any case.

I still don't understand...

...the preserved anchovy sauce. It's Thai or Vietnamese, and it comes with strict instructions not to refrigerate after opening. They just lay the fish out in the sun, then transfer them into huge pots, and, after centuries (okay, after a very long time) they tap off the sauce. It separates on standing, it's a most unappetising battleship grey with a hint of pink colour, and, frankly, it does not smell too promising. But add just a touch to, well, almost everything with a liquid element, and it gives depth, salt, and no fishy tang. Maybe it does take centuries to mature.

Now, if this is allowed by the EU cotton wool wrappers, surely we must be able to import that prawn balichow with real prawns in?

The Thames Delta Blues

Less is more in chickpea world

I've just eaten a really tasty chickpea curry. Two things were critical to the success, I think. It was left standing overnight before I ate it, which probably helped no end, letting the flavours develop. I didn't get tempted into over complicating things. There was just half an onion (the other half went into BLISS' ariabata – more on that later), I didn't skimp on the fresh chilli or garlic, or ginger, but then used just one small measure each of turmeric, garam masala, and mixed cumin and coriander powders. Moistened with a little bit of vegetable stock. Not too moist. Quite a stiff consistency. Quite dry.

It came out really well, the best I've managed at home.

I ate it with a turkey chipotle and lime job, that was searingly hot. “A little jar of ASDA own brand chilli and lime paste”, I thought, “how hot is that going to be?” [Answer, with hindsight – pretty damn hot]. So I put in an additional nine green chillies. To give it a bit more pep, to up the oomph, to deepen the heat, a tad.

It almost burnt my brains out.

My eyes were watering, my nose was running, and when I went outside, the neighbour's rooftop photovoltaic array had the national grid meters spinning and everything lit up like a very bright thing.

So I ate the leftover nuclear chipotle and turkey supernova with the chickpeas (including just the three green chillies) on he side to cool it down.

Hence BLISS' over hot ariabata. I put in just a dash of cayenne and a smidge of paprika, and I did taste it, just the sauce, without the pasta or any grated cheese, and thought it had a pleasant, low-level heat to it.

I guess asking me to test whether her dinner is too hot is like asking a heroin addict whether that cup of espresso it doing much for him. It's impossible to tell. There's something addictive about chillies, and when there's a nice big bag of those hot green ones in the fridge, I can't imagine cooking anything without using some of them. Why would you?

They must constitute part of one of the seven a day we're supposed to eat now. In conjunction with fresh ginger, garlic and coriander leaves, that little lot, working together, must amount to one of the seven, surly?

Oil City Confidential

A documentary of stars: Wilko Johnson (a beautifully insane man, a genius), Lee Brilleaux, and his widow, The Big Figure, John B Sparkes. Canvey Island, Essex's Dungeness, with oil instead of nuclear power. The Feelgoods playing live. I was desperate to see them in the 70's, but it never worked out, somehow. Jake Riviera, who's Stiff Records marketed that “Kill Time / Murder Success” wall-clock. There's the Shepherds Bush Empire, the other small London music pubs where they regularly played. Brilleaux's beautiful mum, her shaky old lady voice, saying they went to see the Feelgoods play a big gig, and “although we didn't really understand it, we couldn't sleep all night afterwards, we were so excited”. They must've been in their forties or fifties.

Julian Temple produced the film. It moves along almost too quickly. It flies past, it's over too soon.

Wilko Johnson talking about playing 45's at 33 rpm, working out how to play simultaneous rhythm and lead on the same guitar...shivers down the spine.

Things unravel at the end, personalities that work too close, too hard, for long enough, will be at risk of falling out.

Among the closing footage is the remaining Feelgoods playing the Lee Brilleaux memorial gig, and loving it.