RosieH

are you a hottie?

If you chopped off a vampire's head, would it still come after you?

I thought this was about a man who was, you know, at the apex, uber-alpha.

How many threads have you killed? Forum pashes? Who do you secretly want to slap really hard (even though you pretend to be perfectly reasonable), so you can't go to forum drinks? How soon is now? That pain on the side of my nose - is it a beer bruise or is it going to be the mother of all festering buboes?

Thanks Mick Mac, but I really mean it - I have been indulging myself a little bit in self-pity over Christmas - but actually you know, things are really not so bad. No one's dead, and the world's a beautiful place. Mostly. (Here). In lots of places it's unimaginable. But we're not there and I'm not usually an evangelist but my god, the price of a loaf in Lucas bakery is a nice problem to have, is it not?

I think in this, as in many stories, there's a strong element of common sense that needs to be applied. Harry's a f*cking idiot to capture himself calling his comrade Paki on film. Whether or not it was harmless fun, or there's an element of institutional racism and tacit consent on behalf of the friend because he knows it makes his life easier to play along, Harry's a fricking idiot. He's in line to the throne. He's been photographed in a nazi outfit. His f*cking media team should have taught him better. I don't doubt that they have, and if he hasn't learned the lesson I would just imagine that this is why most of our royals only have a gcse in art history to their names - borderline learning difficulties - and why it's a very good idea that crown and parliament are separate. As for the term Paki, I think charliecharlie said it right, context is all. You can say a word with no malice in your heart. Your friend can hear it with no malice in his. But if you have an audience, and the word you said is generally considered offensive, then you're a bit of an idiot yourself to think that your audience is not going to be offended by what you said, regardless of what is in your heart and that of your subject. The pen is mightier than the sword, sticks and stones, the signifier and the signified. Words have power, and they're impossible to take back. Personally, I just think people would sometimes do well to remember that.

You know, Jah Lush, I was thinking just the same today. In no kind of bid for sympathy, the last couple of months have been shit for me: my dad had a stroke, but he's ok and at home; my sister was diagnosed with ME after months of tests for MS, but in all I think she's actually just a massive hypochondriac (no offence to those who were helpful in the ME respect, there's other stuff); my mum had an armed robbery but she wasn't shot; I lost my job but I've got some interviews... Things could, by and large, be an awful awful lot worse. Today was fecking beautiful - did you see it - beautiful. Blue skies, cold, crisp, little fluffy white clouds - gorgeous. Most depressing day my arse. Tell it to someone in the Congo.

I had my drawing of an owl displayed in The Gallery. I loved that man. And Morph. And Morph's bad white wrong 'un friend - was his name Chad? A valuable lesson in wrong 'uns that I failed to learn at an age when it cwould have stood me in good stead for the years to come. R.I.P. Toe Knee Heart (in memory of a particular episode where he encouraged us to develop a coat of arms based on our own names - his syllables offered rich territory - as did all his programmes). I hope his family is very proud.

mea culpa, I didn't read further up the thread to see the devil's advocate bit but you're being incredibly disingenuous if you're comparing "paki" to "black people". You wouldn't use nigger but you would use paki - they're both perjorative terms - what to you makes the difference?

capt_birdseye, you're a genius - I'd like to set up a stocks on Goose Green where we could pelt the wrong-doers with their overpriced produce

PeckhamRose, do you feel the same about the word n*gger? Words are imbued with power and meaning that go beyond your exact meaning in the very moment you say them. A word that has strong racist connotations doesn't lose them just because you don't consider yourself racist. People have been trying to reclaim the word c*nt for years - it still remains one of the most offensive in the lexicon

Yes, I had an english teacher at primary school who was obsessed with teaching us grammar (separate a rat, crocodile smiles anyone?) but suddenly I'm unsure and might need to go and look it up do you already know Orwell's five rules? the sixth being the barbarous thing I mentioned above? for anyone who doesn't, it's well worth a read - inspirational

haha, no not at all - my understanding has always been that "none" can take either singular or plural so think you're both right (though if anyone knows different, feel free to correct me too!) - I just wasn't 100% on whether that's what you were doing I just love grammar pedantry in all forms but I've always gone with George Orwell on the whole, break any grammar rule rather than say anything barbarous

Sarah J. Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > shambles Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > none of us is perfect. sorry :)) > > > Actually, is refers to singular, Are refers to > multiple. Apologies. Sarah J, not sure I follow - are you correcting shambles?

ooh, wine I have - I'll order a chinese then i don't have to go outside again and can go on blogs and forums and slag off BT!

Dostoevsky's The Idiot - great story, made me want to be a better person, (which I need right now), and I think that's a pretty good recommendation for a book

f&@*ing w@nkers the lot of them - my week's panning out like that too - just had my card refused in tesco because some f*cker (BT) took some kind of unauthorised payment on my card. Apologies and it will be refunded except it will take a few days and I was buying my tea! and now I have no food. and I had cash, only I'd forgotten to take it out with me. and I could go back but the rage and indignity have left me needing to avoid that area for a while I hate everyone and everything. grrrr

You're right - I remember being horrified when I first read A Taste of Honey and realised that Morrissey had cribbed almost the entire thing for his lyrics - my how my dreams were shattered But I haven't read HP so can't comment with any accuracy - just wanted to show off the Goethe quote!

Sarah J Dew Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Re: Harry Potter > > Clever plagiarism at it's best....seek out all the > slight variations on words, phrases, and > characters from Lord Of The Rings, Star Wars and > Narnia to name but a few. > > It seems unfair. Wrong, even. Maybe. However "Everything has been thought of before, but the difficulty is to think of it again." (Goethe) I've never read Harry Potter, no interest in doing so, but I think any of us would be hard pressed to ignore every reference from everything we've ever read or seen when writing something new... (particularly as there are allegedly only 7 stories in the whole world)

thanks everyone, and don't worry about the what you'd do in an emergency conversation - I'm not too sensitive about it - just glad to know my mum's safe after potentially very foolish behaviour. She can't explain it herself - she says it was neither bravery nor stupidity, just reflex action on the adrenalin of the situation and with hindsight ahe might have done things differently. I think none of us ever really know how we'll react in that kind of situation or what the consequences might be (did anyone read the personal story in the front of the Guardian Weekend yesterday?), but I'm still dead proud of her.

to be fair, being a BYO, they miss out on the stratospheric mark up most restaurants put on wine and the profitability that goes with it - so they put a big mark up on the tap water instead - the mark up might be huge, but ultimately 50 pence isn't going to break the bank

Thanks guys - I am feeling better now I've made it to Oxford to see her - and it helped just to vent a bit. Ladygooner, mum's post office is in a village just outside Oxford - she had miss marple style visions I think of genteel semi-retirement (with maybe the odd murder over a custard cream) - instead she's been ram raided, mugged for the takings and now held up at gunpoint - I'm hoping she calls it a day. And bigbadwolf, you're right - there is something comical in the image of a 60 year old postmistress chasing a masked gunman - I'm thinking of getting her ninja training for her next birthday.

I'm very angry and a bit weird this morning. My mum has a village post office, and yesterday she had an armed robbery. After the guy made off with the money, she chased after him and only stopped when he pointed the gun at her and threatened to kill her. Which in a way I think is kind of uplifting and in most other ways absolutely terrifying and I want to kill her myself for being so stupid / brave. And it makes me really mad that no one ever intervenes when someone's being aggressive on the bus. Then I read this morning about the guy who was killed in an armed post office raid on Friday. So it kind of makes sense. But I just wanted to say, "big up my mum".

er, Newsnight I think we only have ourselves to blame to be honest - they're trying to get an audience in - if we all stopped going online for our news and sat down to watch it as we did in days of yore when there were only three channels, then they wouldn't have to go pandering to the lowest common denominator the BBC still has two flagship news programmes in the shape of Today and Newsnight, try watching / listening to them instead

I once kicked a crutch out from under a cripple who was going too slowly in front of me when I was walking along Lordship Lane. I said to him as he lay on the ground, "you'll not do that again sonny" and do you know what, I bet you fifty quid he won't