Fluffy Bears & Pee

FROZEN PLANET

The press seemed to have kicked off today because a little bit of the best television show of recent times, Frozen Planet, was filmed in a German Zoo. The footage of baby polar bears, the likes of which has never been seen before, has pissed off all of about 12 journalists and no one else, because they were tricked into thinking it was filmed in the polar regions and not at die zooe. This is despite it still being amazing footage, despite the risk that cameramen would’ve had to have taken to film it in the wild and despite the fact that this is no way as bad as calling up and deleting the answer phone messages of a murdered girl. Which to be fair, I’d be really really appalled if Attenborough did that as it’d seem waaaaay out of character. I’m just saying that they really shouldn’t criticise the best program on TV for a slight bit of ‘TV magic’ of the very best and educational kind when the press itself is far more responsible for lies. Also, I’d far prefer a few lies about polar bears than about our countries finances systems, people’s personal lives or terrorist attacks. Attenborough is one of the few reasons (sadly) that the BBC is worth keeping anymore, don’t drive him away because he didn’t want to send cameramen into small holes in the Arctic in order to have their faces gnawed off by big bears. Which incidentally, the press would’ve have given him even more shit for.

I’m terrified what will happen when they find out Animal Park was all filmed in a zoo…..

 

FLUFF

My attempt at Christmas shopping this morning, despite romping around the West End for some hours, has resulted in only one small present being bought, as well as some oil pastels I’ve got in an attempt to get onto some arty things over the festive season, and a tub of Marshmallow Fluff that I’ve bought in order to make sure I’m so spazzed out of my mind on diabetic sugar highs I won’t get anything done at all. Or possible make the most trippy, odd artwork pieces ever, based on the glucose spirals I see swirling in front of my eyes once I’ve had a teaspoon full. I shouldn’t go near the stuff but the fact is I have a stupidly vicious sweet tooth and the cloudy white stuff is a bit like eating magic. Nothing should be that fluffy and that tasty all at once. Nothing. Except candy floss, which is another form of my personal kryptonite. I’m fairly sure that both of these evil devices were made by rogue fairies whose entire purpose in life is to make my death day that little bit closer. So far too much of the Fluff has been in eaten in the few hours since being at home. Myself and L have already taken to eating it with a spoon, and then smothering it on a cake. I even dipped my clementine segments into it knowing full well that any vitamins that piece of fruit contained were drowned in candy joy, and now won’t reach my heart or the parts of the body it should as its so globbed down with goo it probably hasn’t made it much past my throat. Hooray for fluff. I fully expect to be found on Christmas eve so tangled up in it that I spend Xmas trapped in a door frame like a fly in a spider’s web. The only noise I make, the ‘fluff fluff’ of my exasperated breath as I try to eat my way out of it, but keep having such high blood sugars I pass out. In an odd way, I think I would be fine about this. Hooray for fluff.

 

PEE-TERMINATION

According to some newspaper articles, Cameron desperately needed the toilet while making his Euro Veto decisions last week, in an attempt to focus his mind. I have heard that this is something Stephen Fry has recommended on QI, but I can’t, for the life of me, think why that would work. When I need to pee, all I can think about is how much my bladder hurts and that I need to pee. To even try and think about the consequences of a fiscal union between EU members would be very beyond me, let alone just thinking about not peeing. 100% of my brain power kicks into ‘survival mode’ whereby I think of the nearest place I can pee, and go pee. I’ve left gigs of my favourite bands, during favourite songs, just to pee, missing that entire track barging through crowds in order for relief, so making diplomatic decisions I could not do. Though judging by Cameron’s decisions I’m not sure he could either. I just hope this doesn’t become a new fad, where all major decisions become flawed by added toilets in planning works, or major water works ideas never finished due to the amount of accidents when mentioning its flowing system. Silly silly idea indeed.

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Cost Of Living

Wow the world’s a mess isn’t it? I’m finding it so interesting watching as day after day another group of economists, traders or world bank institutions start to forecast a complete global economy collapse. I don’t understand it all, but it seems everyone’s now borrowed up to their eyeballs and what with bail outs draining the few remaining steady country’s banks dry, I’m guessing there will just be one day where someone announces there is no money left in the world at all and then we’ll all panic. Or let China take over. I wish I was more clever to really understand the ins and outs, but honestly, what does happen if the economy does just collapse? Will it be like the Soviet Union in the 80′s when people would have to cart a wheelbarrow full of money to buy bread? I never understood why those people didn’t save a lot of hard work and effort and just use their debit card. Or why other people didn’t try and rob them? Though I guess if that much dosh only bought a loaf of bread, then stealing a handful of it would barely get you a penny sweet and therefore be more effort than its worth.

What I’m curious about is that if the global economy did collapse bit by bit, starting with the crumbling of the Euro, then surely we’d all be ok? I mean surely money would cease to be of value at all? How could a shop ask for money to buy something if they themselves don’t have money to buy their stock and so on and so forth? I’m sure its not as simple as that. As the loathsome trader said on the BBC interview yesterday ‘anyone can make money from a crash’ and I guess that someone will always still be rich even when everyone else can barely afford to survive. But what I don’t understand is that if, say, the US economy collapses, the Eurozone collapses, and large parts of the rest of the world owe money to those factions, who will be making money? China and India? Well maybe, but who will buy their exports? Again, this is an overview I have without any clue as to how it actually works, but I am hugely entertaining myself hoping that we can go back to the days before monks invented banks. Or before money was invented.

I almost long for the idea that I could swap three bags of potatoes for a car. I’m not sure where I’d get the potatoes from in the first place, but I’d damn well try. It’d be lovely if all of us had to have something to give to receive. I’d do some jokes for some tomatoes you grow in your garden, someone else can knit a jumper in return for getting their washing machine fixed. It can’t be that difficult can it? Someone who’s good at drawing charts can draw charts that say exactly what everything ever is worth in comparison to every other thing ever, and suddenly we’ll have an exchange rate based on conkers and lentils rather than the US Dollar or the Yen.

Of course it won’t happen. Things will just get worse, public services will suffer as governments continue to lend money they don’t really have to people who are broke because of borrowing money they didn’t have and no one will ever point out that as it doesn’t exist in the first place and really, in comparison the life, the universe and everything, its really insignificant and we should probably just press ‘clear’ and start again. I should so so totally be in charge sometimes.

Too Far From Home

I don’t think I’ve ever felt homesick whilst in Edinburgh before. Usually the stress of performing combined with the lifestyle that entails during the month means that I remain caught in a bubble whereby nothing from outside the Scottish city seems of importance. Last night though, I wished to be home in London more than ever. I’d have thought I’d have been glad to be so far away from such horrible senseless violence and destruction, but actually I just kept worrying about everyone I know in London, family, friends, and everywhere I know in London. Landmarks, shops, streets I regularly see and pass by, now scarred by fires and damage. Despite being out last night I stayed glued to Twitter and the BBC and Guardian updates, checking every two minutes, praying that it hadn’t spread to anywhere where people I knew were, and hoping it wouldn’t hit my area while I’m away and unable to secure my home anymore than it already is. As I saw it spread in 140 character updates I became genuinely concerned that it might never end. It felt so horribly dystopian, this heartless and materialistic looting, wondering how so many can have so few morals or care for others lives and property.

 

It’s interesting seeing where the blame is being passed today. There have been horrible comments by the BNP and many right-wing comments have been popping up on my Facebook feed condemning the thugs that are doing it. I don’t mean to excuse them from blame or at any point say that it a large part of it wasn’t just opportunistic gang violence, many jumping on the bandwagon merely to take part in the fracas. However, we have to wonder how they got to this mind set. How on Earth has the capital been allowed to get overrun by disillusioned youths? Why weren’t people protected and why wasn’t this stopped before it spread all over the UK? The blame, once again, can be easily pointed at the government. Youth and support centres have been closed en mass over the last few months, prospects for young people have got lower and lower as jobs and education is cut and with most public services being cut back you can’t help but link it to the rioters’ need for damage and destruction out of boredom and despair. As for protection, well the Metropolitan police force has had some severe cuts recently, due to the ‘debt’, in both officers and back room staff, so no wonder they were overwhelmed. Sadly there’s no shortage of gangs in London, so its an unfair equation. Yet the government that have caused it wouldn’t speak on Newsnight last night. The Prime Minister didn’t even consider coming back from holiday until it had already gone too far. They don’t care. The rioters are never going to break into their mansions in the Cotswalds are they? Of course not. You really have to wonder how we let people who have so little care for the citizens they are meant to be in charge of, run the country. I feel so genuinely sad about it all.

 

I honestly didn’t know what I’d wake up this morning on the news. I had terrible fear that it would be all over the country, with every city awash with fires and abandoned buildings. It seemed so final last night, a sign that things have now gone too far and too wrong, that I passed out with tiredness and a frown on my face. Getting up today I checked my phone within seconds and saw that @riotcleanup on Twitter was already organising a mass fixing of the damage. Various repair services saying they’ll help for free, coffee shops offering free food and drinks to those that help and people all over the city clubbing together with true ‘blitz spirit’ to help each other out. The bits of information about Turkish men in East London fighting off thugs to protect their area and various other members of communities sticking together to ward them off warmed me inside. Faith in humanity isn’t lost. While a truly horrible thing has happened what it seems to have shown that we do have power in numbers and sticking together is more important and useful than anything our failing government has and will do. This has got to be a sign that things need to change and I only hope that things don’t need to get worse before they get better. Really wish I was at home to help everyone and all that are have nothing but my utmost respect, whilst those that have suffered have all my sympathy.

 

I honestly don’t know what I’m going to say in my show today but doing a topical hour I feel I can’t just ignore it. Good luck everyone coming too see me at 1.45 today…..

Serious-Lee

I’ve just seen the last episode of Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle season 2 and while I thoroughly enjoyed it once again, I am also slightly sad that the series is over so soon. I think I’m pretty much correct in saying that in terms of comedy there is, and has been, absolutely nothing else like that on British TV for quite some time. Non-patronising, non-conformist, unglossy straight stand-up as it should be, on telly as it is. I have, as many other also, been a fan of Stew back to the Fist of Fun days where the ‘Moon On A Stick’ chants, ‘Green Jelly’ and many of Simon Quinlank catchprases would echo around a small group of friends at school. Not quite cool enough to be widespread parlance but cult enough to make us feel like we were in the know for watching it. Its mix of silly and challenging gags blew my mind at a time where I was yet to be introduced to Chris Morris, Daniel Kitson, Mark Thomas or many other comedians that would change who and what I grew to laugh at and more importantly, with.

 

I remember when Stewart Lee first came to a Fat Tuesday to watch Danielle Ward, back in 2005. I was a bit overwhelmed that someone I used to idolise on the telly would want to come and watch at my gig and despite letting him in for free he insisted on paying because he said it was important he did so. I mustered up the courage to ask him to come back and headline at some point and he happily agreed. Since then I have seen, worked and drank with Stew on regular occasion but he is still one of the people who in the back of my head I slightly freak out about when I meet him, holding what he does in such high regard. This second season of the telly series has kept him very much in that catergory of acts for me.

 

Its not just the material, which is brilliant, but also the willingness to leave in the live element of glasses smashing or people getting up to leave during the show. The unashamed presentation of just a man on a stage and showing stand-up how it should be. I still wasn’t a fan of the sketches, much like with series one, but they were less intrusive this time round, being placed at the end of the episode and I have a feeling that may have been more of the BBC’s decision to have them in the first place, the corperation seemingly constantly afraid to just have stand-up in pure form unless on a huge stage.

 

So, without meaning to spend the whole blog gushing about Lee, what bothers me is why there can’t be more programs like this on TV? Why does it take all the years Stewart has been doing comedy and all his other accolades before he was allowed to create a show that he knew how to make funny and intelligent? Stew is brilliant but there are lots and lots of excellent acts and writers out there who are submitting superb ideas every week, yet so few of them get through the net of mediocrity, criticised for not being facile enough for a BBC3 audience who only like the sort of jokes that three year olds frown upon for their purility apparently.

 

I really hope Comedy Vehicle gets a third series. I don’t know what ratings have been like but we need this sort of thing on the telly. We need comedy that is more representative of what stand-up can be. Comedians have the vantage point of humour to be able to say what we like with the buffering of laughter, so why does television suggest everyone only wants to speak safely about the most mundane aspects of life? I’m going to miss being able to watch something I can genuinely say I enjoy and adhere to write something as good as one day. Please recommision it BBC, for the sake of the public’s intelligence.

 

Sorry. Serious blog today. Amazing how something I enjoy so much can just make me so angry at the failings of everything else.

Rambling Man

Hello blog. You are being crowbarred into my day today in a way that were you a living being of sorts you’d probably find it difficult to breathe and when you finally got out would have uncomfortable cramps in odd places. It has been, as the last few weeks seems to be, another odd whirlwind of a day that, so far all in all, have revolved around me suggesting things and the suggestees saying ‘no’ to different degrees of politeness. I have, thanks to this line of work, become a master at handling rejection. From industry types that is. I still falter at such things from women unless I’m so tanked up on booze I can’t notice, and I get very upset when Tiffany Stevenson’s cat runs away from me as soon as I walk in the door. Aside from that though, you say no to this face and this face will totally take it. Like a weak, non-argumentative, self doubting Thomas. I always wondered why Thomas was so doubting. Tom who I live with is fairly doubting, but I have met a few others that definitely weren’t. Its apparently based on the dude who didn’t believe Jesus was back from the dead, but then, after seeing him, he did believe. I think that this means its not a great term for skeptics or non-believers due to his scaredy cat reforming at the end. I think Thomas should have stoically defended his point of view, hitting Jesus with sticks and treading on his toes until there was undeniable proof it was him, only to them turn around and say that its probably a look a like in a wig. That would be a true doubting Thomas. But instead, once again, a biblical character is praised once again for something that is, overall, a bit rubbish. Much like today being Saint Patrick’s Day where a man is hailed for ridding a country that very likely never had snakes, from snakes. I feel that I should parade around the UK saying I have got rid of all the lions just so I can be a saint. Though knowing my luck, I’d be taken to the lions in the zoo and be told to get rid of them too, resulting in huge death in the face via lion paw/teeth.

What’s nice is that today’s ‘no’s were occasionally interspersed with some ‘hmm’s and a few, and very rare ‘yes’s, along with some stares, and general awkward silences. Its often that these meetings can feel somewhat like the very worst of Pinter plays. I haven’t yet ever worked out how exactly how do these sorts of events and I wonder how anyone ever learns. Some people are easy, and you sit down, banter ensues, everyone’s happy, you leave with a kick in your step and find out five weeks later they want nothing from you. Others seem more difficult at first and then two years later get you in for something. Then some just stare through your eyes into your soul, knowing full well your existence will be of little help to anyone ever. Now, at least, after being in this stupid job for several blue moons, it tends to be more and more the first two. Eventually I will just be able to work it down to the first option whereby I can constantly raise my hopes up high for at least a day or so, before wondering why it is I can’t pay the bills again.

Actually, that paragraph was far too miserable. Truth is, stuff’s all good, but that’s dull isn’t it? Essentially, as readers, you probably want to know about me battling lions or getting the plague or something that keeps it all gritty, don’t you? Well, you’re horrible. Why can’t you just wish someone well for once? Meanies. Yeah. I said it. You all go out tonight, pretend you’re Irish so you can drink more and we’ll see who’s enjoying themselves. Oh. Yeah, its you isn’t it? Yeah, well you go and have fun. Go on. Manners.

I have no idea where today’s blog is going. For your sake you’d better hope all these meetings come to nothing so that this blog can start to make sense again. What do you mean of course they’ll come to nothing? Bloody doubting Thomas.