I call upon the sane and rational...

In the Guardian today there is a story about the race for the Christmas number one. Turns out that Alexandra Burke (Winner of TV "talent" contest X-Factor) has released a cover of the Leonard Cohen track Hallelujah despite the fact that the only cover of Hallelujah is by the one and only Jeff Buckley.

In the name of fairness I actually hied myself over to Youtube and listened to Ms Burke's version and what did I find? That it sucks so much there's a chance I may hunt the bitch down and strangle her with piano wire.

And in case you think I'm overreacting I present to you the same choice I have just made.

Firstly (and in order not to make you biased by making you hear the better version first) I give you Alexandra Burke's version.



And here is Jeff Buckleys version.



Light dawns and the choice becomes clear. Alexandra Burke's version makes you want to kick a kitten across the room in an apoplectic rage and Jeff Buckley's version sets your emotions in gear and can easily reduce a grown man to tears.

So I call upon the sane and rational of the world to go out and buy a copy of Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley in order to send a message to the world of music moguls that states categorically "Talent is more important to the people than soulless, ball-less tripe put together in order to make Simon Cowell and the rest of Satan's little horde rich."

And finally to end this little screed I would like to point you in the direction of the guardian story where a spokesman for Sony BMG (who represent Ms Burke, Mr Buckley and the songs original composer Mr Leonard Cohen) said that the company hoped Burke would take the top spot but conceded:

"Obviously it would be brilliant if Jeff got to No 2."

Which goes to prove to me, and probably to you also, that Sony BMG doesn't have any idea about what qualifies as good music and is only interested in stealing money from the pockets of teenagers. What do teenagers know about good music? About as much as the Burkes at Sony BMG do.

The people of Goon City...

Wish that you would pop along for a visit.

I had to share this...

Because it's possibly the most insane thing I have ever seen.

The guy behind it is named Jean-Yves Blondeau and, as you can tell from his name, he's French. But that doesn't mean we should hate him. Quite the opposite in fact.

Good old Jean-Yves has invented something called Buggy Rollin, a thing that has to be seen to be believed.

Judging by the first question I'm most often asked...

When standing behind the bar at work, I'd say that the people who frequent the place are more often than not brainless idiots...

It's been about three weeks since I started my new job and without fail whenever a new face (new to me anyway) comes in the most popular question is "What football team do you support?"[1] To me this suggests one of two things. Either A.) They are brain-dead. Or B.) They are mindless idiots who measure a man, not by his deeds or his actions, but by which colour the overpaid Prima Donnas kick an inflated pigs bladder around a field he supports wears.[2]

Both of these things are not good. Not good in the extreme if you ask me. I mean what kind of retard judges a man based solely on the football team he supports? Yes, you got it, the kind that likes to drink heavily, watch football and beats the shit out his girlfriend on a regular basis. In other words, my customers.

Seriously, what is the mindset of someone who will come to a judgement on someone based on whether or not he follows the fortunes of the same football team as he supports? To me that's as moronic as it can possibly get. It's akin to judging someone by the amount of sugar they take in their tea, if they prefer cheese or pickle on their sandwiches or whether they like cheese flavoured Doritos or cool original flavoured.

So what, I hear you ask, is my answer?

Well, I don't support a football team because football is as interesting to me as shoving a cocktail umbrella into the urethra of my penis and seeing if I can open it. In other words, it's not high on my list of things to do. In fact I would say that shoving a cocktail umbrella into my urethra is way above joining the herds of football fans on the planet because I don't want to lower my intelligence to that of a retarded monkey who suffers from down syndrome.

[1] Football as in Soccer.
[2] I've come to the conclusion it's a combination of both.

Tonight I learned...

That no matter how hard you wish and plead to the fairies, or kiss a lucky cloverleaf, or click your heels together and recite "There's no place like home... There's no place like home... There's no place like home..." or pray to the very Gods themselves... You cannot transport yourself through the sub ether (Or whatever the correct terminology is) and materialise on a beach in Mozambique.

This was not an easy thing to accept at the time, as I was standing behind a bar trying not to scream in someones face "YOU'RE AS INTERESTING AS A SECOND HAND TEABAG! GET OUT MY SIGHT BEFORE I STAB YOU IN THE HEAD WITH A PEN!", so I focused my concentration and tried for somewhere closer to home... Specifically, Wales.

Don't ask why my mind chose Wales, because I don't know. Of all the places I could have chosen that are closer to my house than Mozambique, which is six thousand and forty three miles away, at the time Wales seemed as good a place as any. Despite the fact that to my knowledge most of Wales is as interesting as watching flies fuck.

After at least a minute of focused concentration I gave in and tried for somewhere even closer to home. More precisely, home itself. The place that, technically, should be the easiest of all. After another couple of minutes of intense and focused concentration I opened my eyes to find that I was still standing in a dive of a bar, in a crappy suburb of an even shittier city.

To my utter surprise the person, whose face I was attempting not to scream at, was still standing in front of me talking away about the most mundane thing ever to have breath wasted on.

"Hello..." I said. "Anyone home?"
"Eh?" Came the monosyllabic response.
"I was just wondering if you were planning on noticing that I'm as interested in this conversation as I am in sampling chocolate covered dog shit." I said, praying that the person to whom I was speaking would chalk it up to humour and not punch me in the face.

The gimp laughed and continued uninterrupted, due to me being busy attempting to make their heart grind to a scrunching, and hopefully very very, painful halt. Once more I was confounded by the powers that be and the person did not seize their chest and die in abject agony.

"Look, sorry, don't take this the wrong way will you but this whole conversation is the mental equivalent of sweetcorn. It's only purpose is to waste my energy." I stated. Making damn sure that the look in my eyes, and on my face, conveyed my heartfelt sincerity on the matter. Jackie Braindead, however, was having none of it. And continued.

For the next five minutes or so I focused all my energy onto making my head go thermonuclear and explode, hopefully taking out as many of these idiotic people as possible. Call it a Smart Bomb... Yet again I was unsuccessful. Though to be fair I did have quite a good headache which may either be ascribed to the concentration level or the annoying sound of their voice, and promised myself that I would try harder next time.

Then came three of the most beautiful words I have ever heard in my entire life...

"Well, that's me."
I steadied myself on the bar, as I had been slightly confused by the the words.
"What?" I asked.
"I'm off." The troglodyte said, draining the dregs of his glass and picking up his mobile phone.

A "Hallelujah" resounded in my head and a small brass band began to play an upbeat tempo'd tune that wouldn't go amiss in a hip and fashionable club in Bourbon Street. Did I hear right? Had the gods observed my plight and saved me from having to listen to the ignoramus in front of me?

I watched in stunned silence as the neanderthal pressed buttons on his mobile and waved goodbye as it headed towards the door.

"Aye man, so anyway, mind I was saying she said that he said that the wifey from the chipshops daugthers cousins pal told her that there's some bird doing tricks for taxi drivers to avoid paying the fare... Well you'll never guess who it is..." It said into its mobile as it walked towards the door, leaving me to ponder if there was some kind of mental deficiency they suffered from that made them talk utter crap constantly.

I turned around and looked at the old guy at the end of the bar who, like so many others in pubs across the world, sits quietly, observing, collating and calculating the ups and downs of pub life and only ever says one of three words at a time*, and raised my eyebrows in a way that I knew would convey the sentence "That guy's a test of your patience is he not?"

The old guy lifted his glass and took a long, drink.

"He's a fucking arsehole and the sooner he's killed by a runaway truck the better." He said.
"Pint?" I asked.
"Nip." He replied.

* The three are the following,..
1. "Pint."
2. "Nip."
And 3. "Taxi."

Very very wierd...

Last week after getting home from work I received a text message from my friend Steff at roughly midnight. The message read... "I just met my 22 year old daughter."

"What the fuck has he been smoking?" I thought, immediately wondering whether or not I could get my hands on some. "It must be damn good stuff if he thinks his daughter is 22 years old, as far as I'm aware Zoe is only 12." I thought. About a minute later my phone rang. Lo and behold, it was Steff.

"Alright man?" I said.
"Whew man... Just whew." He replied.
"What the fuck are you on about? 22 Year old daughter? Have you been drinking?"
"No man... I'll tell you what happened..."

Steff then explained to me that he had been at his Mothers house doing a couple of odd jobs for her and having finished had left and began to drive to pick up his other half, Wendy. When he was roughly halfway towards his destination his mobile phone rang. On the other end was his Mum. "You'll need to come up son. It's important." She told him.

Steff then phoned Wendy and told her he had to return to his Mums and that he wouldn't be long, turned the car around and headed back to his Mums.

Upon arriving at his mums house she said something along the lines of "There's no easy way to tell you this so here goes... That lassie over there... That's your daughter."

"Fuck off..." I said, thinking he was at the wind up.
"Seriously mate... She's my daughter." He replied.

***********

Steff had gained not only a daughter but also a Grand-daughter as his daughter has a kid of her own. His daughter Zoe, who until the appearance of Stacy, was an only child now has an older sister and is an auntie.

It's all very weird...