barrymarshall

I blame the Big Brother-isation of society. Almost every week there is a call for someone to go (get evicted from the House) and while this is dressed up by the Meejah as "people power" or holiding those in power to account, it is nothing of the sort. It's the worst kind of cynical anti-politics. One should resign if one's actions have caused a disaster, but not if a disaster means you have to act. BTW, Northern Rock should be nationalised. It will be the cheapest option. But this government, so in love with economic neo-liberalism, will find it very hard to swallow.

Just to get a bit of totty in here: http://cdn.last.fm/coverart/300x300/13565.jpg I am looking for the "censored" cover of Jimi Hendrix's Electric Ladyland, but am at work and lots of people can see my screen ... if anyone else could oblige ...;-)

cheers MP - that would be most welcome! (tu) in a similar vein, and also a dance-funk piece from 1996, another favourite album cover is Fila Brazillia's Maim that Tune: http://www.trip-hop.net/images/jacquettes/big/421.jpg

now i understand the yolk ...:))

Mockney - I didn't know of anyone else who knew this album. One of my early friends at university did me a copy on tape and it got played and played and lent on and lost ...

you weren't charged with assualt and battery were you? (sorry, could resist that one!)

Agreed, MP, that the Currant Bun is an odious (if occassionally very funny) rag but it is worth getting a bit of perspective. It supported war on Iraq several years ago but most of its own readership were against it. Also, for a right-wing Tory sheet, even at the height of Basildon man Toryism in the late 1980s/early 1990s, it had the biggest number of Labour voters of any national paper. As its circulation started to decline (it still is) Murdoch realised that he wasn't backing the winner and switched to Labour. The Super Soaraway is actualy often scared that it is out of touch with its readers: these days with managing a title in a declining market numbers are the only thing that counts ... And also, it assumes that people read the Sun for the politcs. In surveys (we did this in my Politics A-levels) most poeple said they didn't buy the Sun for its views but for the sport and the 'sleb gossip, or even just for the crossword! Yeah, it has some influence, but exactly what and to what extent is hard to determine. In 1992 it was not "The Sun wot won it" as most Sun readers had made their minds up before the election campaign had begun. Those who read the Sun who were undecided at the start of that election were no more likely to vote Tory than anyone else in the country.

Jeremy Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- Glad you could see the > funny side Barry, but expect you're in the > minority! It was funny only becuase the egg didn't break ... had it left me in an eggy mess I daresay I'd have been fuming. :X Also when I was a kid I, er, did things like that and for me to become Mr Righteous Indignation would be a tad hypocritical :-$ Me and my mate were just walking down the street one lunchtime and it took me by surprise. The guys in the car stopped at a traffic lights a little further down the road and my mate wanted to run for them and give them a good hiding. I'm a wuss when it comes to such things tho.

Not in ED, but when I lived in Stoke I got pelted with an egg from a passing car. It didn't break but just bounced off my chest. It was quite funny actually! Mind, I didn't think we got "that sort" round 'ere ...

http://www.thecharlieman.com/Wonder%20Woman%20-%20Color%20-%20001.jpg

I think the dog, Clarence (?), deserves a special award for being cool.

Locals only, eh? http://epguides.com/LeagueofGentlemen/cast.jpg

Not a favourite, but this one by X-Ray Spex I have always liked. And here's the Girls Aloud version!

MrBen Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Any fellow Scots in the hood care to meet up in ED > for this Saturdays MASSIVE winner takes all game > against the world champions? > Anyone up for it?! BarryMarshall? > seeing as I have been individually singled out, how can I refuse?

Sorry, guys, only got round to posting this Monday morning (lack of broadbandage at home at mo ...) Lovely to meet everyone: Sean, Mockney, CWALD, Keef/Slosh, Breandan, Michael Palaeologous, BB, CitizenED, Mark (again), Jah Lush and everyone else! I felt rotten on Saturday, but that's only because I had a good night on Friday. What time did we leave the pub in the taxi? Was there a lock-in? I'd never actually been to the FHT before. Seeing as it's only, er, round the corner from my flat I may have to venture back out there again. Now, the real test is if I can still match the faces to the names/psedonyms next time...

Mark Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I asked Mitchells and Butler (who own All Bar One) > if there were any plans afoot to open an All Bar > One in East Dulwich, i was told: > > "I've just spoken to the director of All Bar One > who tells me that there's no current plans." Where the f- do these rumours come from then? Seriously, who "invents" them?

No, it wasn't stupid of you to want to help a woman and kids who seemed like they were stranded. I'd have done the same. It's natural to want to help people, but unfortunately sometimes some people take advantage.

Being Sky-less I never saw it - believe it was dead good tho... Ae we on The Road still, or the Proposition? If the Road, yes, I kind of agree. You only appreciate civilisation when its not there. Its real power is that you just don't see it. Of course, in the book it is made pretty clear that civilisation has wiped itself out. But what brings us together and apart are two different impulses towards life and death that work together and apart at the same time. (Ha! Knew this would come in useful ... Reading Freud's Civilization and its Discontents at the mo, if you're wondering where this has been plagiarised from). And in the book the boy is clearly the life instinct, the bud that grows out of the ashes. Throughout the book there is an interplay between the innocence and experience of the child and the father, though each has aspects of both - the boy can be very wise. The book, like many others, is full of dualisms.

Not out till 2009 though ...

... which may not be a bad thing! The guy who directed The Proposition (the Nick Cave-penned Aussie "Western") is said to be making the movie.

Also, someone mentioned that the book had overtones of Beckett's Waiting for Godot, with its themes of cruelty and aimlessness. As much about our own time, then, than some imagined future or past.

You could be right, Sean ... in fact, the book as a whole has a dream- (or, rather, nightmare-) like quality. ETA: Yes, I think that people might behave as they do in the book. After all, how else could they "survive"? Still, and this is why the book is redemptive, the child does not behave that way. He want to help the other boy they encounter, wants to take care of the dog (memory is hazy here ...) to loook after the old man, etc., etc. I am glad that such a high-quality book is being so widely read. Inevitably, though, there is talk of a film. Which might not be a bad thing - if done properly.

I have read The Road and have been recommending it to everyone. There are two things I liked about it in particular. The grammar/punctuation was stripped down, which is characterisitic of McCarthy, but it added to the barrenness of the world he was describing. I think it also showed the breakdown of social order in general and also made you read the book in a more urgent way. Second, it was difficult to tell whether the book was set in the past, present or the future and this adds to the universalism of the message of the book. Yes, it was bleak, but unlike Requiem for a Dream, there is some hope at the end. In fact, I actually thought that the ending was redemptive.

This is actually my all-time favourite, though slight caveat: it's an EP, not an album. Am I disqualified?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/portuguese/especial/images/175_discosrc/5181531_1.jpg