diamond geezer

Thursday, June 09, 2005

Carbon neutrality

Until recently I thought I was living a blameless life as a caring global citizen. But no. Instead I have come to realise that I must bear the guilty burden of forty years of unintentional eco-terrorism. My thoughtless actions are slowly destroying the planet on which I live, and I must make amends. My life, alas, is not carbon neutral. Everything that I do pumps CO₂ into the atmosphere. Electricity consumption, air travel, heating my water, taking the train - it all adds up and it all contributes inexorably towards irreversible global warming. Feel my shame.

I've been brought to my enviromental knees by the recently-released eco-plans of several upstanding public bodies. The government has pledged to offset the carbon impact caused by international flights to the upcoming G8 summit by donating £50000 to green projects in Africa. How worthy. And those jolly nice hype-free blokes in Coldplay have produced a carbon neutral album by planting sufficient trees to cancel out the CO₂ generated by pressing hundreds of thousands of copies of their latest CD. How genuine. Admittedly this is nothing new - top pop group B*witched were busy planting trees in Holland Park as long as six years ago. But going carbon neutral has become the modern path to ethical responsibility - even more worthy than wearing a coloured wristband - and I can no longer stand idly by.

Several companies have sprung up to help consumers to attain carbon neutrality. How selfless.
• Future Forests offer to help you to calculate your personal carbon deficit and then plant trees on your behalf. For example, a long haul flight from London to Australia creates 3¾ tonnes of CO₂, which can be offset by planting 5 trees at a cost of just £50. How inspirational.
• Carbonfund pledge to offset your personal carbon footprint by "buying up carbon dioxide credits from sources around the world and retiring the emission credits". Just send them some money and let them ease your conscience. How credible.
• Climate Care meanwhile are busy investing in several worthy environmental projects around the world. Tell them your personal habits and you can repay your carbon debts online, or even pay off someone else's carbon debts as a gift instead. I owe them at least £75 apparently. How criminal of me not to have noticed before.

So I've decided that diamond geezer must become the world's first carbon neutral blog, starting today. Here's how.

• Every kilowatt hour of generated electricity emits approximately 0.4 kg of CO₂ into the atmosphere.
• Home computers (with monitors) use approximately 0.2 kilowatts of electricity every hour.
• I get about 400 visitors each day, and let's assume they all stay here and read my blog for two minutes.
• That means that your blog visits are damaging the environment at the rate of 0.4 × 0.2 × 400 ÷ 60 × 2 = 1 kg of CO₂ each day, near enough. Which is just over a third of a tonne a year.
• One tree offsets approximately one tonne of CO₂ throughout its lifetime.
• I can therefore offset your blog visits by planting one tree every three years.

I hereby pledge to make diamond geezer carbon neutral by planting a tree on Monday 9th June 2008.

You too can assist global recovery by making a few simple environmental savings, like not using your washing machine until it's full, switching off your phone recharger and riding a bike to work. Quick, before the Maldives disappear. Me, I'm sitting here in the dark.

posted 07:00 :

Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Welcome to the Creative Lounge [3]
Take a seat. Take a deep breath.
Now, try flexing your creative muscle...

See if you can come up with a few perfectly crafted names for the following.
I started you off, and now I've added some of your best ideas. Any more?

Surnames
Many surnames are derived from the professions of our long lost ancestors, eg Smith, Taylor, Miller. But what if surnames were based on modern professions instead? Your suggestions please.
Modern surnames: Grillburger, Pierce, Consultant, Browplucker, Bailiff, Joyrider, Holistic-Therapist, Loanshark, McFryer, Van Rental, Blogger, Keystroke, Doley-Scrounger, Outsourcer, Analyst, Specialist.

Place Names
Many place names are derived from longstanding local landmarks, eg Newcastle, Salt Lake City, Southend-on-Sea. But what if place names were based on modern environmental features instead? Your suggestions please.
Modern cities: Builton, Greater Asbo, Flatchester, Innittown, Chavvington Uppergiro, Stabbington.
Modern towns: Little Prospects, Hellmouth, Downmarket, Bigotton, Boredom-on-the-Dole, Dormaton, Chipping Parkanride, Landfillville.
Modern villages: Nimby, Fonemast Green, Slurry Deep, Runway, Much Soughtafter, Houseprice-Bubble-on-the-Wold, Bypast.

Live 8
Live8 may be a good idea, but Sail8, that's just silly. What further ludicrous protests might Bob Geldof come up with to try to influence the G8 Summit in Gleneagles next month? Your suggestions please.
8Events: Blind8 (matchmaking for the visually impaired), Sed8 (concert featuring bland artists like Dido, Michael Bublé and Joss Stone), Asphyxi8 (see previous description), Overw8 (campaign for obese Americans to send food parcels overseas), SALive8 (the South African Live8 concert - mouthwatering), Pontific8 (should the Roman Catholic Church support St. Bob or not?), InTxt8 (SMS campaign urging you to include Sir Bob's pet charity in your will), Extermin8 (Dr Who convention), Discrimin8 (just to show that some are worse off than others), Intoxic8 (Get Pissed For Africa), Flagell8 (S&M for Poverty), Fornic8 (promoting the missionary position), Impregn8 (combatting population decline in the developed world), Gest8 (nine month campaign following the previous event), Anticip8 (a peculiarly British protest where you just queue up outside the G8 conference in Edinburgh and wait for something to happen), Vacill8 (the mostly likely outcome of the G8 Summit).

posted 07:00 :

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

The last lap

A giant lady athlete stood motionless outside Stratford station yesterday. She was of reassuringly indeterminate ethnic origin, she was holding aloft a Union Jack and she looked like she'd just smashed the record for the women's 100m sprint (which is not difficult when you're ten metres tall). The good people of Stratford went about their daily business at her feet, trying hard to ignore the TV cameras pointing in their general direction and the whirr of the BBC News 24 helicopter buzzing overhead. It could mean only one thing - London's pre-Olympic hype was in full swing. Yes, in just one month's time the International Olympic Committee will be meeting in Singapore to decide whether my local neighbourhood gets to become a regenerated hub of global importance or remains a barren industrial desert.

Yesterday the IOC published its final report on the five cities bidding to win the 2012 Olympics. The good news is that London received an excellent report, praising the comprehensiveness of the bid and the rather splendid legacy that the Games would leave behind. The even better news is that New York, Madrid and Moscow received less glowing reports (especially Moscow which is basically dead in the water). The not-quite-so-good news is that the Parisian bid has been deemed essentially perfect with barely a word in the wrong place, and so Paris remains the firm favourite to win the Games in one month's time. But not yet a dead cert.

Gold: Paris (1-4 favourite), public support 85%
Silver: London (3-1), public support 68%
Bronze: New York (12-1), public support 59%
4th: Madrid (33-1), public support 91%
5th: Moscow (100-1), public support 77%

According to the official IOC opinion poll, 11% of Londoners strongly oppose the Olympics being hosted in East London. That 11% no doubt includes those employed by the factories in Marshgate Lane which will be forcibly relocated ~~when~~ if the Olympic Stadium is built on top of them. I took a walk through this doomed trading estate yesterday. Banners and graffiti on the walls of this smoked salmon factory made it very clear that the Games are not wanted here. Official 2012 banners were erected here last week but somebody local has already been round with a big pair of scissors to cut most of each sign down, leaving just a few sad white strips flapping limply in the wind. The whole area may look like a polluted dump full of scrapyards, incinerators and warehouses (and indeed it is), but local people's livelihoods will be extinguished if London's bid is successful, and these ex-workers will be expected to pay higher council tax for the privilege. Roll on July 6th.

All of my 2012 Olympic reports are now available on one page, here.

posted 07:00 :

If there's still one slight question mark hanging over London's bid, it's transport. Heaven knows why the IOC still think that two tube lines, two DLR lines, two suburban rail lines, an inter-city railway and a Eurostar International station might somehow not be quite enough to service two weeks of visiting tourists, but apparently they're not. Or maybe the IOC are just worried we won't build them all in time...

"Whilst the Olympic Park would undoubtedly leave a strong sporting and environmental legacy for London, the magnitude of the project, including the planned upgrade and expansion of transport infrastructure, would require careful planning to ensure all facilities and rehabilitation projects were completed on time." (IOC report summary)
So I've carried out my own consumer test to see which of the top two bids is actually the most accessible:
• London (06/06/05): Exit my house, walk east past Bow Flyover, turn left up Pudding Mill Lane, arrive at proposed Olympic Stadium. Total walking time = 14 minutes.
• Paris (23/04/05): Exit my house, take DLR to Canary Wharf, take Jubilee line to Waterloo, arrive Eurostar terminal, queue through security and customs, wait half an hour for train to depart, crawl through south London, chug across Kent, zoom under Channel, whizz through Northern France, arrive Gare Du Nord, try to find correct 'B line' platform, get lost down urine-stained back stairs, stand for ten minutes waiting for packed commuter train to leave platform, ride a mile out of town, walk ten minutes north from station, arrive at proposed Olympic Stadium (Stade de France). Total travel time = 4 hours 50 minutes.
London wins, QED.

posted 06:59 :

Monday, June 06, 2005

Road pricing - the way forward

2005: Transport secretary Alistair Darling proposes the introduction of road pricing to replace road tax and petrol duty. He hopes to avoid LA-style gridlock.
2006: Civil servants set up a database ascribing a price per mile to every road in the country, ranging from 1p [Norfolk, country lane, 5am] to £5 [M25, 5pm, Fridays].
2007: Trial project begins in quiet Norfolk country lane - declared huge success.
2008: Government awards £9 billion contract for the setting up and maintainence of the National Journey Database to an incompetent private company.
2009: Satellite tracking devices start to be installed in vehicles (now known as ID Cars). Cost of annual MOT increases by £93.
2010: Road pricing introduced, replacing road tax (but not petrol duty because that's a nice little earner).
2011: Rich people continue to drive anywhere they like as often as they like, whereas poor people have to take the bus (or stay at home if there isn't a bus).
2012: A round trip by road from London to Edinburgh now costs more than one year's road tax used to.
2013: Motorists start buying gas-guzzling 4x4s instead of green eco-friendly cars because they cost the same per mile so why not?
2014: Tourism collapses as people choose not to hop in the car for a nice day out any more.
2015: Riots when motorists on the M1 refuse to follow a 40-mile diversion to avoid roadworks.
2016: Police start using satellite tracking data to issue remote electronic speeding fines.
2017: Quiet country lanes in Norfolk now jammed by buses.
2018: Slots for journeys down the M25 now have to be booked a week in advance.
2019: LA-style gridlock happens anyway, but at least the government knows exactly where every car is.
2020: Conservatives swept back into power when working class voters are unable (or rather unwilling) to drive to their nearest polling station.

posted 07:00 :

Live 8 tickets!!!
For the chance to win 2 tickets to the London event send us the answer to a simple question...
www.live8live.com
Live 8 question!!!
Exactly how many African artists has Bob Geldof signed up to appear in the Live 8 concerts?
www.live8live.com
Live 8 answers!!!
A) lots
B) one
C) none at all
Text A, B or C to 89599, now!
www.live8live.com
Text us yer f***ing money!!!
Each entry costs £1.50 plus your standard text charge. Thankyou.
www.live8live.com
Ads by Geldof

posted 00:01 :

Sunday, June 05, 2005

Silver discs (June 1980) [A monthly look back at the top singles of 25 years ago]

The three best records from the Top 10 (3rd June 1980)
M*A*S*H - Theme from M*A*S*H (Suicide Is Painless): How cheerful - a sweet little ditty about the futility of life lifted from the 1970 movie version of M*A*S*H. The film's producer, Robert Altman, wanted a funny but stupid song to accompany the 'last supper' scene and so asked his teenage son Mike to write the lyrics. Result: one very rich son. The Manic Street Preachers returned the song to the Top Ten in 1992, alas presciently.
"The game of life is hard to play, I'm gonna lose it anyway, The losing card I'll someday lay, so this is all I have to say: Suicide is painless, it brings on many changes and I can take or leave it if I please"
Lipps Inc - Funkytown: I don't think I fully appreciated this cheesy masterpiece back in 1980, probably because I wasn't frequenting disco dancefloors at the time. Or maybe I just hadn't spotted the desperately clever pun behind the name of the group. The tune may be basic and the lyrics may be trite but the overall effect is still as hooky as barbed wire, even today.
"Gotta make a move to a town that's right for me, town to keep me movin' keep me groovin' with some energy. Well I talk about it talk about it talk about it talk about it, talk about talk about talk about movin'"
Specials - Rat Race: A well-aimed gobbet of anti-student vitriol, laid down in black and white by Jerry Dammers and his 2 Tone supergroup. The ska lads had emerged from Coventry the year before, rude boys all, and had yet to be eclipsed by labelmates Madness. Musical youth had rarely been so street, so angry and still yet so hip. Porkpie hat and loafers, anyone?
"You're working at your leisure to learn the things you'll need, the promises you make tomorrow will carry no guarantee, I've seen your qualifications, you've got a Ph.D. I've got one art O level - it did nothing for me"

My favourite record from June 1980 (at the time)
Gary Numan - We Are Glass: Don't worry, I was never a card-carrying bleach-faced Numanoid, I just sort of liked his early music. This track, however, was the first indication (post Cars) that our Gary might not be immortal after all. It shot into the charts at number 10, unheard of in those days, but stalled well short of the expected number 1 slot and vanished from the charts in six weeks flat. Nowadays all records slam and plummet like this, but Gary was nothing if not ahead of his time.
"We are cold. We're not supposed to cry but it's all just a thought so here am I. We are glass."

20 other hits from 25 years ago: No Doubt About It (Hot Chocolate), Crying (Don Maclean), Over You (Roxy Music), Let's Get Serious (Jermaine Jackson), You Gave Me Love (Crown Heights Affair), Let's Go Round Again (Average White Band), Back Together Again (Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway), Just Can't Give You Up (Mystic Merlin), D-A-A-Ance (Lambrettas), I'm Alive (Electric Light Orchestra), Don't Make Waves (Nolans), Behind The Groove (Teena Marie), Twilight Zone - Twilight Tone (Manhatten Transfer), Substitute (Liquid Gold), Little Jeannie (Elton John), Christine (Siouxsie & the Banshees), Play The Game (Queen), To Be Or Not To Be (BA Robertson), New Amsterdam (Elvis Costello), The Scratch (Surface Noise) ...which one would you pick?

posted 09:00 :

Saturday, June 04, 2005

Big Brother 6
1) The first Big Brother housemate to be evicted each year is always female. Bad luck Mary.
2) The first housemate to be evicted should have been shallow slimy hairdresser Craig, who works here in Norfolk.
3) Those nice people at Digital Spy watch E4 for you, then provide live updates of what's happening in the house.
4) I live just down the road from the site of the original Big Brother House in Bow - archived report here.
5) See the annual Lego cartoonfest that is Big Brother's Extremely Little Brother, or download more cartoons here.
6) If you've arrived from Google or Yahoo looking for shots of Lesley, Saskia or Sam then my apologies, there are no pictures of their well-rounded personalities here. But there are plenty here and here.

your views on the housemates (so far):

Lesley comments
Kemal comments
Maxwell comments
Makosi comments Sam comments
Science comments
Saskia comments
Craig comments Derek comments
Anthony comments
Roberto comments
Vanessa comments

(in order of most-commentedness)

posted 08:00 :

Bow Road station update: The refurbishment project at my local station drags on into its seventeenth month. Everything's nearly finished, but nobody seems quite able to tie up all the loose ends and end the whole charade. In fact management have pretty much admitted (in the latest edition of the Metronet company magazine) that the whole modernisation of Bow Road has been a drawn-out incompetent balls-up. Well, in so many words...

Work at Bow Road will be completed and the station formally handed back to LU in the next few weeks. Metronet Rail SSL Project Manager Bobby Vijay admits that the first station has been a big learning curve for Metronet and LU. He said: "There have been several important lessons learnt from this project. Examples include early scope agreement, the need for an early intrusive survey, practical design solutions and starting the handover process earlier. Ambiguities in the contract caused further delay in agreeing scope and delivery.
I'm always nervy of anbody who can drop the buzzwords 'learning curve' and 'project scoping' into a conversation, and rightly so in this case. It sounds as if Bow Road has been used to trial inefficient and untested procedures, a triumph of bureaucracy over engineering, and never mind the inconvenience to local transport users.
A number of unforeseen obstructions were encountered during the construction phase. An example was the discovery of horse hair in the plaster within the ticket hall area causing a two-week delay to that part of the work. For Bobby, the final hurdle will be the handover procedure, which has yet to be tested. LU staff have to be trained in use of the new control room which monitors the full CCTV coverage as well as a new fire-alarm and PA systems.
I'll be delighted when somebody finally works out how to turn on the new 'next train' indicators, because they're not much use to me otherwise, although I suspect my local station staff are still too busy being taught how to use the 50+ security cameras now at their disposal. One day, maybe soon... but maybe still not.

posted 07:00 :

Friday, June 03, 2005

Day 1000

Today is the 1000th day since I started blogging. Which is a bit of an achievement (although looked at another way it's just another number, and a number that sounds a lot better than "2 years and nearly 9 months"). Most impressively, to me anyway, is that I've managed to post at least something on 982 of those 1000 days. I was a little slipshod back in the very early weeks, and I missed a few days in 2003 while staying away from home, but for the last 2 years I've posted something every single day (bar my usual short Christmas break). It's not healthy, is it?

There are two kinds of blogger - those who post regularly and those who don't. Which are you?
• Those who don't post regularly walk around thinking "Ooh this is interesting, I wonder if I can blog about it?" It's a sensible attitude, not inflicting your thoughts on the general public unless you think there's something worth saying, although it can lead to very long gaps between posts or even, in more extreme cases, the legendary 'blog hiatus'.
• Those who do post regularly walk around thinking "What am I going to blog about next?", which puts a rather different complexion on things. Some end up posting about the dull minutiae of their life just for the sake of it, while others go out and do stuff just so that they can write about it. It's certainly not easy to keep up this blogging lark regularly without running out of steam, as many have found to their cost.

Me, I walk around asking the subtly different question "What am I going to blog about tomorrow?" This adds a whole new layer of pressure because missing a day is somehow an admission of defeat, and encourages the non-PC art of forward planning. For example, I spotted that Day 1000 was coming up about two months ago, made a note somewhere and then remembered to write this post about the milestone earlier in the week. Regent's Canal week was also carefully pre-meditated and pre-planned, more as a huge challenge to myself than in the hope that any of you might actually want to read it. But I'd hate you to think that the majority of this blog is clinically executed. I have absolutely no idea yet what I'm going to write about on Saturday, just that an idea will come and that I will post something on here that's hopefully worth reading. Maybe it'll be something I see, or something I read, or something daft that somebody says, but that inspiration will come. It's this constant series of daily deadlines that's egged me through the last thousand days of diamond geezer, and hopefully this creative energy will continue for many more days to come. Now, what am I going to blog about tomorrow...?

posted 00:30 :

Thursday, June 02, 2005

Scarily easy ways to fill daily blogspace (number 1)

Two pigeons on the District Line

posted 00:05 :

Wednesday, June 01, 2005

You know it makes Ad Sense

Everybody else is doing it, so I thought I'd sell my soul to the devil and introduce advertising on diamond geezer. Apparently it's the perfect way to fully realise my blog's revenue potential. Don't worry, only carefully selected adverts related to site content will appear, and they won't be in any way

4-star London hotels
Book your perfect London 4-star hotel accommodation online in minutes
www.fourstar.co.uk
Out and about in London
What's on and where to go in the capital? We've got the answer, now.
www.outlondon.com
Jamster club: Crazy Frog!!!!
Get this crazy sound and ride with the frog each time you get a call!
www.crazyfrog.com
Regent's Canal barge tours
Cruise in style along this polluted backwater. Packed lunch included.
www.regcanal.co.uk

intrusive. I'm really looking forward to monetizing and enhancing my content pages with precisely targeted ads. I'm assured that these carefully chosen sponsorship messages will encourage users to keep coming back for more. Regular readers will appreciate the well-matched additional information provided by this unobtrusive service. Nobody, I'm sure, will think this site somehow cheaper, tackier or more disreputable.

Big Brother bosooms
All your favourite housemates,
all the cleavage,
all the time.
www.boobb6.com
Sudoku online
Subscribe now and you too can stick lots of digits
in lots of boxes.
Only £10 a month.
www.sudokool.co.uk
Bing Bing!!
The Crazy Frog is back in town and on the run.
Join the Jamster Club for more fun.
www.bingbing.com
Cats spoiling your gardening?
Keep cats out of gardens with our deterrent products. Buy online.
www.deterAcat.com

But I can't make my blogfortune if you readers don't click on my ads. So please click on a few of them, or preferably all of them, even if you're not interested in what the advertisers have to offer. None of the sites will try to hijack your computer and install spyware, honest. I'm told that for every thousand clicks you make I'll receive a payment of 50¢, which at today's exchange rates is almost a whole Mars Bar. I'm going to become very rich indeed, but only if you lot play along. Go on, you click on me and I'll click on you.

Unlimited Vi@gra spam
Sign up and we'll fill your inbox with unstoppable spam emails, forever.
www.bluetabs.net
Please click here
The pop-ups never stop after you install our browser hijack software. Guaranteed.
www.ebastards.com
Crazy Frog ringtones
Just text x7 for the monos, x8 for the polys or x9 for the reals to 666-666
www.dumbteen.com
Campaign for ad-free blogs
Get these bloody adverts off your blogs now, you mercenaries!
www.scabs.com

Sellout? What sellout? The future's in prostitution, you know.

posted 00:05 :

Tuesday, May 31, 2005

The best of May

Local film of the month: The League of Gentle men 's Apocalypse

You've probably not seen this film yet because it's not released til Friday, but I was lucky enough to attend the Preview Screening at London's Trocadero last week. They were giving away free tickets (precious things) via a national newspaper, so it's not as if I'm important or anything, but even the official World Premiere isn't until tomorrow evening so I'm chuffed enough. Three of the cast even popped in after the closing credits for a question and answer session, making this special stuff indeed. However you'll probably see the film in relative comfort, whereas I was squashed into a packed Screen 1 on one of the hottest nights of the year with malfunctioning air-conditioning and hundreds of sweaty punters.

Most of the audience were freeloaders like myself or arty media types, but there were also three suspicious-looking older gentlemen scattered around the front of the auditorium. One had a dodgy grey/white combover, while another gorged on a bread roll while reading a battered broadsheet. My first thought was that three vagrants had crept in and would probably fill the place with their alluring "street stench", although that's more usually a problem to be found in Stratford than in Soho. But when the third gentleman stood and waved unashamedly across the theatre to greet the others, I decided that these were more likely members of another mysterious community - newspaper film critics. These are men who live in permanent semi-darkness, their eyes squinting as they scribble incisive barbed reviews in their moleskin notebooks, and are rarely to be seen in real life. I nearly changed my mind back again during the final Q&A session, however, when combover man asked the most inane question as if he hadn't really been watching the film at all. Or maybe he writes for the Mail.

But what of the film itself? Would the League's army of freak characters transfer successfully to the big screen? And would the package be more entertaining than the somewhat questionable third series? Well, rest assured, it's a winner. The plot sees the Royston Vasey crowd let loose to cause havoc in the real world, or at least a small selection of the town's inhabitants. Playing the full range of characters proved too much for the cast during a limited filming schedule, so instead the story concentrates on demon butcher Hilary Briss, dodgy German Herr Lipp and coarse businessmenn Geoff Tibbs. Never fear because Tubbs and Edward get a splendid cameo at the beginning, Pauline and Bernice are sprinkled throughout, Papa Lazarou intrudes briefly and you'll never look at a giraffe again after Dr Chinnery wields his semen extraction tool. And the plot is clever, because the "characters meet their creators" idea could have become so self-referential that the whole film would have fallen flat on its face. But throw in an 17th century historical subplot, impending Armageddon, the usual bizarre weirdness and some sparkling witty dialogue and you have the recipe for success, I reckon. Alles klar?

I've never seen an entire audience sit through the full closing credits of a film before, not since the days of the national anthem, but we all stayed put to meet and applaud Mark, Reece and the elusive Jeremy. The comedy quartet (minus Steve) tried to answer questions about the film, while members of the audience seemed more intent on asking questions about the TV series. We found out that coming up with the idea for the movie had taken ages, that Ireland's a very cheap place to film and that these are three people you could happily chat to in a pub for hours. But we only had 30 minutes, after which we rushed to escape the sweaty sauna and return to what we hoped was the real world.

posted 08:00 :

Monday, May 30, 2005

Big Brother 6

the housemates Anthony
aka: Anthony Hutton
23 from County Durham
hairdresser & 70s dancer
self-centred mummy's boy
shallow male totty
odds: 9/1  comments (4) Craig
aka: Craig Coates
20 from Norfolk
another bloody hairdresser
camp gossipy bitch
immature softie
odds: 16/1  comments (6)

Derek
aka: Derek Laud
40 from London
gay Tory speechwriter
1st black foxhound master
father of the house
odds: 12/1  comments (4) Kemal
aka: Kemal Shahin
19 from Liverpool
bisexual belly dancer
Eurovision addict
camp and confident
odds: 8/1  comments (8) Lesley
aka: Lesley Sanderson
19 from Huddersfield
dance student & PVC nurse
the Sun's busty favourite
implanted flirty bitch
odds: 20/1  comments (4)
Makosi
aka: Makosi Musambasi
24 from High Wycombe
cardiac nurse
sparkly Afro princess
'unlucky' 13th housemate
odds: 16/1  comments (7) Mary
aka: Mary O'Leary
31 from London
witch & alien abductee
either spiritual or bonkers
withdrawn and startled
odds: 11/1  comments (4) Maxwell
aka: Maxwell Trotter Ward
24 from N London
maintenance engineer
geezer with lagerbreasts
Arsenal fan & wideboy
odds: 7/1  comments (11)
Roberto
aka: Roberto Conte
32 from London
PE teacher
immodest Italian gigolo
relaxed and smooth
odds: 7/1  comments (3) Sam
aka: Samantha Heuston
23 from Surrey
marketing student
wildly enhanced cleavage
intelligent pin-up
odds: 8/1  comments (7) Saskia
aka: Saskia Howard-Clarke
23 from London
promotions girl
loves fake tan & false nails
opinionated ladette
odds: 7/1  comments (7)
Science
aka: Kieron Harvey
22 from Leeds
musician & entrepreneur
ghetto spokesman
fiery street guru
odds: 8/1  comments (5) Vanessa
aka: Vanessa Layton-McIntosh
19 from London
business studies student
loud, spoilt & up for it
immature gossip
odds: 20/1  comments (3) Your thoughts on this year's rabble are most welcome...

...or just tell us you don't give a damn
comments (19)

posted 07:00 :

Sunday, May 29, 2005

Dumbing down
• The 'new' Dome: After six years in mothballs, the Dome is to reopen in 2007 as an "entertainment city". In a multi-million pound sponsorship deal with a mobile phone company it will also be rebranded as The 0₂, which has to be the most ludicrous name for a public building I've ever heard. I really can't imagine Londoners "popping down The 0₂" for a night out - it doesn't trip off the tongue easily. Maybe the vodka-sodden, the lairy and Bryan Adams fans will lap up the new venue, but I think I much preferred the Dome as a rundown abandoned folly with a decent name.
• Big Brother 6: Much as I love Big Brother I've been relatively immune from total addiction in the past because I couldn't watch the constant live streaming on E4. But now, as E4 comes to Freeview, I can, and it's proving dangerous. I've watched Maxwell sleeping, I've watched Derek wake up early to do the washing up, I've watched Makosi and Lesley arguing about the fine detail of the shopping list, and I've even watched all the housemates undergoing their official fire safety training. It's all the dull stuff they edit out before the evening highlights, totally inconsequential and therefore dangerously fascinating. But don't worry, I promise not to get hooked for the next eleven weeks.
• Crazy Frog: The worst thing about watching E4 (and many other digital channels) is the endless stream of ad breaks filled by tacky low-cost commercials. At the moment we're enduring saturation coverage of the most annoying Jamster Crazy Frog advert, usually at least twice during each break, with Nessie The Dragon and Akon's Lonely also thrown in for good measure. Are Britain's youth so thick that they need to see this grinning amphibian bing-bing across their screen eight times an hour before they finally decide to commit blindly to a £3-a-week subscription service. Well yes, sadly they are that thick, which is why the Crazy Frog/Axel F hybrid is about to hog the top of the UK singles charts for the next umpteen weeks. Would never have happened in my day...

posted 08:00 :

12 number 1 records which would have made monster ringtones
(but thankfully never did)
Telstar - The Tornadoes (Oct 1962)
Sugar Sugar - The Archies (Oct 1969)
Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep - Middle Of The Road (Jun 1971)
Shaddap You Face - Joe Dolce Music Theatre (Feb 1981)
The Chicken Song - Spitting Image (May 1986)
No Limit - 2 Unlimited (Feb 1993)
Saturday Night - Whigfield (Sep 1994)
Mr Blobby - Mr Blobby (Dec 1994)
Cotton Eye Joe - Rednex (Jan 1995)
Barbie Girl - Aqua (Nov 1997)
Teletubbies Say Eh-Oh - Teletubbies (Dec 1997)
Bound 4 Da Reload - Oxide & Neutrino (May 2000)

posted 07:59 :

www.flickr.com : Take a virtual walk along the Regent's Canal...
...or read the whole walk on one page here.

posted 07:00 :

Saturday, May 28, 2005

Walking the Regent's Canal
Stage 6: Victoria Park to Limehouse
(1½ miles)

Victoria Park: The final stretch of the Regent's Canal heads south through Tower Hamlets to the Thames. Victoria Park comes as a welcome green respite after the long grey haul through Hackney. You can either yomp parkside along the towpath or slip in through the Canal Gate for a stroll beside the lake terrace or a sprawl on the fresh-mown turf. Victoria Park was laid out in the 1840s as a philanthrophic gift for the East End's rundown masses, although what the local urchins made of the lamplit carriage drive is anyone's guess. It's still packed out, but with joggers, sleeping grandads, trainee footballers, multi-racial couples and kids queueing for melting ice creams. The Regent's skirts the ornamental west end of the park, while the rather quieter Hertford Canal runs along the southern edge. The two meet just south of Old Ford Lock at Duckett's Junction, so be careful to carry straight on at the humpback bridge or you'll end up (eventually) at the old Big Breakfast House.

Mile End Park: And then, almost immediately, a rather more modern park. Mile End Park is a thin strip of politically correct open space, divided up into well-meaning zones for "play, art, ecology, sport and fun". It's rather nice, but it's no surprise that Victoria Park is always busier. You can drop into Bow Wharf for a giggle and a pint at Jongleurs, although the Palm Tree in the ecology park is a much better bet if you want a traditional East End boozer. Just past this traditional warehouse on the western side (pictured), students at Queen Mary University are stacked high in tiny (but architecturally impressive) flats. Shame that crippling debts mean they'll never be able to afford any of the other canalside apartments along here, of which more and more are gradually being built along this section. The famous Green Bridge carries grass and trees over the Mile End Road, although I was more impressed by the steely resolve of a pair of swans nesting amongst discarded litter in the bullrushes a little further on. The sound of bhangra blared from an upstairs window, and Little Venice suddenly felt a very very long way away.

Local attraction 6: Ragged School Museum
Life was no fun round here in the 1870s, which is why Dr Barnardo bought up two canalside warehouses and opened them as the Copperfield Road Ragged School. He offered the very poorest local children a free education, and threw in breakfast, dinner and a roaring log fire for good measure. By 1896 there were more than 1000 children on roll (and 2500 on Sundays), but government inspectors shut the place down for health and safety reasons a decade later. The building is now a unique museum, aimed particularly at school visits but also opened to the public on the first Sunday of each month. I visited earlier this month and snuck around the local history exhibit, the racial equality display and the pre-war kitchen. Highlight of my visit, however, was attendance at a lesson given by oh-so-strict Victorian teacher Miss Perkins. She gave us slates to write on, made us chant some Empire geography facts, ordered us to sit up straight and swished her cane around with aplomb. I'm not sure that I could have coped with that level of strict discipline on a daily basis, nor even that I'd have learnt very much (apart from how to cope with backache). You might fare better.
by bus: 309

Limehouse Basin: After a quiet half mile plagued only by flies and cyclists, the Regent's Canal approaches its final destination in London's Docklands. There's one last lock beneath a Grade II listed DLR viaduct and then, assuming they ever reopen the towpath, you walk out into the luxury enclave of Limehouse Basin. This was one of London's first riverside docks, linking traffic on the Thames to the inland waterway system and built large enough to accommodate sea-going vessels. It used to be packed solid, such that (so they say) you could walk from one side to the other by jumping from one boat to the next. Today the basin has been reborn as a 90 berth marina surrounded by glass and steel apartment blocks - all yachts and yuppies. The rich may come here to play with their floating toys, but the tied-up narrowboats bring the place back down to earth. There's one last lock between the basin and the river, with flashy electronic gates and a swing bridge operated by two uniformed blokes wearing what looks like Arsenal kit. I watched them in operation as a sleek white yacht sped out of the basin, past the bistro pub on the corner and out into the Thames. This canal terminates here.
by train or DLR: Limehouse; by bus: 15

posted 09:00 :

Friday, May 27, 2005

Walking the Regent's Canal
Stage 5: Islington Tunnel to Victoria Park
(2½ miles)

Most canal walkers don't make it to the other side of the Islington Tunnel, which is a shame because the canal on the other side of the Islington Tunnel is also very pretty. But only for the first 500 yards. The waterway emerges into a green cutting lined with trees and houseboats, drops through yet another lock and opens out into City Basin. This is the longest (and widest) of all the sidearms on the Regent's Canal and was originally the main unloading point for goods destined for the City of London. Now it's the perfect spot for junior kayak training at the local Boat Club and, this being Islington, for the creation of a "a vibrant and active waterspace". There's a blue and white tiled mural on the northern wall, the title to which should read REGENT'S CANAL except that the centre section containing the S and C has unfortunately fallen away. Some locals walk no further before returning home, while others are brave enough to continue over the invisible border into Hackney.

Sorry, but the two miles through Hackney are the least attractive on the canal. Not that there's anywhere truly ugly along the way, but equally there's nothing especially outstanding. There are a couple of scenic locks, some pleasant arched bridges and this splendid gasholder, as well as various well-judged arty installations along the canalside, but most of the walk is dominated by flats, blocks of flats and long flat towpaths. The canal gentrifies all that it touches, even the harshest council estate, but you sense that local architects haven't repaid the compliment. Indeed there are several waterside apartments, both old and new, where it must be better to be on the inside looking out than on the outside looking in. As another blogger so appositely phrased it, "this is a nice walk, though it has rape scene aura to it".

Rest assured that the Hackney stretch does have its highlights. Drinkers sit at wooden tables in front of the Rosemary Branch in De Beauvoir Town, a characterful pub which also contains a tiny theatre. The long-faded remains of a painted rainbow can just be seen on a sewerpipe arching over the canal nearby. To the east of Kingsland Road (pictured) the pillared remains of a dismantled railway bridge can be seen, originally supporting the mainline out of Broad Street and soon to be reborn as the northern end of the East London Line extension. The hooligan element have been out in force with black marker pens at CANAL WALK. Pigeons congregate nearby, pecking at discarded takeaways in the turd-strewn grass. Historic Broadway Market leads down from London Fields, an unexpectedly characterful shopping street that's well worth a diversion. Mare Street, on the other hand looks much better from underneath. And don't worry, the decent scenery will soon be back - those trees in the distance are the welcome sight of Victoria Park.

posted 08:00 :

Regent's Canal characters
• Boaters: They own narrowboats with names like Nemesis, Hartley Harlequin or Meandher II, they chug pointlessly up and down from here to there and back, they go nowhere fast, but I suspect they're all having a whale of a time.
• Joggers: If you're lucky enough to live near a canal, what better destination for a bit of regular (but lonely) heavy breathing?
• Anglers: More solitary hobbyists, who might have more luck dipping their lines if the waters weren't so regularly disturbed by passing narrowboats.
• Cyclists: Champions of the sustainable transport environment, although not one of them appears to be able to read the words "Please dismount beneath bridge".
• Dogwalkers: Come rain or shine you'll see them trudging along the towpath, plastic bag in gloved hand.
• Lowlife: If you're lucky, that shining glint is just a lager can, a cigarette lighter or a bling pendant. If you're unlucky, it's a knife.
• Walkers: That'd be me then. And maybe you?
• Ducks: Quack, quack quack quack.

posted 07:00 :

<< click for Newer posts

click for Older Posts >>

click to return to the main page