Happy Birthday Hunter...

It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era — the kind of peak that never comes again. San Francisco in the middle sixties was a very special time and place to be a part of. Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run... but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant...
History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of 'history' it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time — and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened
My central memory of that time seems to hang on one or five or maybe forty nights — or very early mornings — when I left the Fillmore half-crazy and, instead of going home, aimed the big 650 Lightning across the Bay Bridge at a hundred miles an hour... booming through the Treasure Island tunnel at the lights of Oakland and Berkeley and Richmond, not quite sure which turnoff to take when I got to the other end... but being absolutely certain that no matter which way I went I would come to a place where people were just as high and wild as I was: no doubt at all about that...
There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda... You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning...
And that, I think, was the handle — that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply PREVAIL. There was no point in fighting — on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave...
So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark — that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

Hunter S Thompson - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

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."

Big Wave Surfing Wallpapers...

Here are some big wave surfing wallpapers for you.

To download the full size image click on the thumbnail.

And for those of you who just can't get enough of big wave surfing here's a truly amazing video documenting the evolution of the sport itself from the early pioneers of Pipeline, Waimea bay to the modern day surfers of waves such as Mavericks, Jaws (or Peahi as it is also known) and what some have claimed is the perfect wave, Chopu.



By all means whip yourself over to google video and download a copy of this movie as I can honestly say it is one of the best surfing videos ever made.

It takes a certain dedication...

To stay up all night to watch baseball.

And it takes even more dedication to stay up until 6:30am to watch the longest allstar game in history, which is what I'm doing now.

I'm going to be shattered later.

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...

Anyone for Calvinball?

Many of you out there in t'internet land are fans of the six year old boy genius that is Calvin (and his friend Hobbes) so I've decided to post a few wallpapers of him and his faithful companion.

To get the full size images click on the thumbnail.

Calvin and Hobbes read the funnies.

Calvin and Hobbes take a walk in the snow.

Pulling Faces with full colour background.

Calvin and Hobbes doing homework.

Getting a hug.

Various Pictures.

Doing a little dance.

Pulling faces white background.

Sledging.

Pulling faces black background.

Sleeping.

I don't know about you...

But I've always found Stewie Griffin singing Rocket Man funnier than words can convey. So imagine my surprise when I stumbled across the inspiration for it on youtube. Believe it or not it's based on William "Captain Kirk" Shatner's rendition of the same song at a 1978 sci-fi convention.

Here's the video.



And to finish here's a small joke...

Why didn't the woman go out with Captain Kirk after their first meeting?

Because William Shatner.

Ever needed to resize a picture?

But don't want to bother with all the associated nonsense in photo shop?

Well, help is at hand with Picresize.com a site that allows you to upload the pic and re-size it there and then. Easy to use and practically foolproof I highly recommend this site.

FAO Canada...

Doug Stanhope is playing Cafe Chaos in Montreal on the 18th and 19th of july.

Relax...

Whack these tunes on and chill out.

William Orbit - Adagio for strings.*

Sigur Ros - Milano.

Groove Armada - At the River.

Jimi Hendrix - Little Miss Strange.

REM - All the Right Friends.

Elliot Smith - Because.

Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah.

Foo Fighters - Aurora.

*Mum, download that and let Dad hear it. It's a piece of music I said was brilliant and he got Stuart to get him a copy of it. Sadly it was being played on the bagpipes. This is the version that doesn't make you want to shove freshly sharpened pencils in your ears.

"Jesus died for your sins..."

She said. With a totally straight face.

She was collecting for a new church and had inadvertantly stumbled into the lions den.

"Talk about a waste of time." I said, as I was bored and she was annoying me with her constant harping on about the, so called, saviour of humanity. "My sins are what makes me interesting."
"Surely you don't mean that." She said with a look of pity on her face.
I pondered for a second the possible ramifications of offending the god squad again.
This took less than a quarter of a millisecond and I continued.

"Actually I do. My sins, and believe me there are many, seperate me from the herd of waste of space sheep who follow the herd blindly without questioning the reason or the logic of blind faith." I said, smiling.

Her face changed from a pitying look to one of minor offense. I knew I had her on the brink and all I needed was to give her a small shove to push her over the edge.

"Jesus gave his life so that you could live." She said.
"Actually, Jesus died because his own people handed him over to the romans and went "He said he's the son of God, get him." because if they had lynched him for his claims of divine decendency their god would have laid down a shitstorm on them." I challenged.

I could see by her face that there was anger welling up. So I carried on.

"You do know that Jesus, the real one, was nothing like the tall, fair haired deity you worship blindly don't you? When you think about it rationally and take into account his place of birth and the time in history he lived in you'll come to the conclusion that Jesus was a big nosed short guy who was less than five feet tall. Think along the lines of the love child of Tom Cruise and Barry Manilow and you're on the right lines." I ranted.

At this point she left the pub.

It must have been the look...

In my eyes that spoke to him.

"You look like the type that should be travelling." He said.
"What makes you say that?" I asked, looking up to see the guy at the end of the bar who had spoken.
"You've got the look in your eyes that says you would rather be somewhere else."
"That could be down to the fact I'm working here."
He looked around at the forlorn four walls of the pub and sighed. "Nah, it's more than that, but I see what you mean." He said.

A couple of minutes passed as I served the only other person, with the exception of him and I, in the bar.

"Have you ever seen Nepal?" He enquired.
"Only in pictures or on TV." I replied.
"I've been twice. I found a small farm house at the base of the Himalayas, tiny place, hardly anyone spoke English, no TV, no radio, no cell phones or other distractions, just the mountains stretching as far as you could see. When the sun comes up in the morning the mountains are a shade of pink that you have to see to believe," He stated.

He drained his pint and placed the empty glass on the bar, picked up his small plastic bag full of shopping and began walking towards the exit. As his hand connected with the door handle he turned and looked around the pub.

"Do yourself a favour kid..." He said, turning to leave. "Go and see the Himalayas in the morning sunlight. They're pink."

All wisdom can be found in anagrams.

Here's a little thing for you to do if you have a spare five minutes or indeed, need a distraction from the day to day grind.

Firstly, open another window and whisk yourself across the void of t'internet to here.

Done that? OK, good.

Now do you see the little box that looks like this -->

Type in there (without quotes, any of these... [ Or these... ] and replace the words YOUR NAME with your actual, written on your birth certificate, name.) the following words...

• "What is [YOUR NAME]"

Hit the get anagrams button, wait a second or two for the results.

Read.

Find the ones most appropriate or humourous and ponder.

My favorite one is as follows...

"What is Ross Douglas"

• A Dialogs Short Wuss.
  

There are times when this is very true.

Like now.

There's nothing like a nice quiet pub...

And my new place of work is nothing like a nice quiet pub...

So, I'm back in the land of the worker after a small sojourn as a government artist (I was, after all, drawing benefits...) and I have come to the conclusion that I need to get the hell out of bar work before I go irreversibly insane.

It's not that I hate working behind a bar, it's more down to the fact that the bar I'm working in makes prostitution look like a viable alternative. Despite the fact I'd earn less money than a one legged, facially disfigured hooker with enough STD's to keep a science lab at work for a few years.

The bar I'm working in, and don't bother asking the name of the place as I have been down that road before and know for sure that I could be sacked for airing my views on here, is populated by the type of people that could appear in Shameless and not seem even slightly out of place.

So what else is there that I can do to earn enough money to live? Well, I could go back to being a fishmonger but, quite frankly, that's my last resort as it's an unpleasant job at the best of times and I have no desire to carry around the permanent smell of fish again. There's only so many times people can make remarks about you smelling of fish before the temptation to whip out a fist becomes overpowering.

As it's Friday night tonight the hordes will be clamouring to fire as much booze down their necks before closing time and will, without a shadow of a doubt, attempt to stay back after hours and ask, several times, if they can have a lock in.

What I'd like to know is this... Why do people think it's perfectly acceptable to hang around after a place has closed for the night just because it's a bar? If I were to turn up at their place of work and demand that they stay behind for no wages and sell me things when all they want to do is go home they would, quite rightly, refuse.

Of course, the lock in nonsense will only emerge at the end of the night. Before then I'll have to put up with... The same song being played on the jukebox at least twenty times... Out of tune singing of made up words which (to them and them alone) have a comedy value that beggars belief... People ordering drinks that they can't pay for and wondering why you get ratty about it when you tell them to leave... Morons who think it's somehow manly to drink five jagermeister bombs (Jagermeister with red bull) and puke their loads in the toilets... And many more offenses to my spirit.

Just thinking about this makes me want to fling my notice in and run away to Canada. I hear it's very nice this time of year and has an annual comedy festival...

Telemarketers suck balls...

Which is why this little clip of comedian Tom Mabe taking the piss out of one is so damned funny.

Over 35? Still single?

I just read an article on t'internet that started with that horribly personal insult. Don't ask me for the link as I was so incensed I rapidly had to go and look at some porn to re instill my faith in the fairer sex. That's a joke ladies... I'm all for feminism, women's lib and equality of the sexes. After all, you deserve it, don't you, you pretty little things.

Anyhoo... What's wrong with being over 35 and single? I'll tell you what... The horrible aching hollow you feel in the heart when you pull cold covers over your body at night... The nights of lonesomeness weeping into a Kleenex after watching a pirate copy of the new Sex and the City movie... The female friends setting you up with friends who have a reputation for being "Easy*" and that's not to mention the piles of invites to trendy art galleries where your city friends ply their trade and give you free champers.

That's my life right there. Aye right... Is... It... Fuck...

There's no doubt that somebody in the world is over 35 and single and enjoying a life like that but trust me it's not yours truly. I'm more along the lines of, porn and pot noodle while I watch comedy DVD's and thank the stars that I'm as repulsive as it is humanly possible to be.

Porn. It's cheaper than dating.


* See: Would fuck a soccer team after a sniff of jagermeister.

What a shocker...

Last week I signed up for the worlds first internet balloon race.

The reason for this was I was bored and fancied giving it a whack just to see how my wee balloon would get on without me promoting it at all. After signing up and choosing my little orange balloon I left it all alone to wing its way across the internet.

I never checked its progress nor did I get anyone I know to poke the little swine into a higher gear so imagine my surprise when I came in second!

Everyone likes music...

But not everyone likes downloading music illegally. For this reason I've decided to list a few sites where free, and 100% legal, music can be had.

Download.com not just for programs don't you know.

Legaltorrents.com full of legal torrents for download.

Archive.org full of live tracks by many varied artists.

Freealbums.blogsome.com A well written blog containing a whole cornucopia of freebies for those who just can't get enough of new music.

Chopu will eat you up and spit you out...

But that's not about to stop these people riding it.