Thursday, January 18, 2007

TV Hell

I know it is a cliché to moan about TV, though I think I will do so here. Last night followed the usual pattern, as most workday nights tend to follow.

I usually come home from work and throw something into the oven that’s easy to cook and usually barely edible – as most of my cooking tends to be.

At no point in the night did I decide to put the TV on. This was mainly due to the paucity of anything worth watching to be fair.

Instead I spent the time listening to music, reading and going on the Internet. I seldom watch TV these days – unless there is something on specifically that I would like.

I wouldn’t miss it if I was to get rid of my TV, but that would mean I wouldn’t be able to watch my DVDs – a mainstay of my week.

This could turn into an anti-licence-fee rant but I feel that BBCi and the Radio are worthy of the licence-fee alone. One of the good things about my TV abstinence is that thankfully I have missed Nonentity Big Brother – though it is something that I would avoid anyway.

Apart from the usual washed-up has-beens and nonentities, this series has thrown up a fair bit of controversy over the racist bullying of the Indian Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty. Though I have not watched the programme – I have seen the alleged clips of racism on the news today. It is hard to describe the people in question as card carrying Nazis – I just think it may be the fact that are swimming in a shallow gene pool.

What do they expect? It is lowest common denominator TV, starring people from the lowest-of-the-low. Jade Goody is a vacuous, excuse for a human being anyway, but rolling out the rest of the family is a nadir, not just in the history of Big Brother, but TV. They are scum and pond life.

The rest are a f*cking waste of time and should be horsewhipped – not just for the racism but for the fact that they are a bunch of tossers. Rant over!!

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

We Are All Doomed


Apparently the Doomsday Clock now stands at 11:55 having been pushed forward by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (the organisation that devised the timepiece) as a result of the current concern over the threat of global warming.

The clock, which was set up in 1947 once reached two minutes to midnight in 1953 at a time when the United States and Soviet Union were involved in nuclear testing.

The clock has been moved backwards and forwards on 18 occasions in its 60-year history and reflects the prevailing political climate of the time.

This is the nearest that the clock has got to midnight for a number of years and the reasons this time are not just as a result of unstable political factors, but also for environmental reasons.

I guess I better clear out my shed and convert it into a panic room/shed to ward off the impending cataclysmic meltdown.

Shame really, as I was looking forward to a busy February.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

It was 50 years ago today

The most famous club in Liverpool’s history (other than Everton) turned 50 today.The Cavern a club made famous with an association with The Beatles, celebrated an anniversary with a series of events.

It is a club that I have a fondness for and not just because of the links with The Beatles, but it was also a place that I spent some of my formative drinking years.

I remember the first time as an underage 15-year-old setting foot down those winding stairs to the dank atmosphere of The Cavern below – this could have been a disappointment to some – but not for me it was magical.

I can even remember what I drank in those days, it would without doubt have been Cider. (That must be the right of passage, as most underage drinkers start on that before ascending or should that be descending to drinking Lager).

At the time I didn’t realise that it was not the original club, but a carbon copy in roughly the same location on Matthew Street. In a typically short-sighted Liverpool City Council decision it was demolished in the 70s to make way for a ventilation shaft for the underground railway system – that ultimately wasn’t required.

It is a club that I suppose I started a relationship with one of my first girlfriends. It was a place that I lapsed from being a vegetarian after almost twelve months of abstinence. After a particularly inebriated night, the waft of the smell of onions from the botulism-burger van on the Matthew Street was too much of a temptation to overcome.

It was also a place where I ruined a pair of white jeans (I think they were just about fashionable at the time) when I decided to take James’ song Sit Down literally and park my arse on the floor amongst the dregs and slops – and no doubt other detritus that accounted for a night out in the Cavern.

I have taken numerous foreign visitors there who have not failed to fall for the charms of the old place.

Happy birthday and here’s to another 50 years in existence and hopefully I can fulfil one of my long held dreams and actually play a gig there.