This Nation's Saving Grace

Raping the rotting corpse of the Celtic Tiger!

2009-07-17T23:13:00.008+01:00

There is no shame in being angry and afraid. At least not to me. We all need a healthy dose of rage in our lives, it greases the wheels of justice from time to time. And now, I think, is one of those times where we really need it. It is time for us to get mad. We are being run by a confederacy of wide eyed dunces, a loosely aligned group of avaricious pigs who are tied together only by their love of money and their allegiance to a party. There are no policies, there are no ideologies, there are not even ideas. Just grotesquely childlike foolishness and blindness masquerading as a plan. There is no shame in getting angry and afraid when the place you live in is being flushed slowly down the toilet. Take pride in your anger because now we really need it.

Did any of us ever think we would land ourselves in this situation ten years ago? The real tragedy is that they have blown the greatest opportunity we will ever have, perhaps the only opportunity we will ever have, to be an equal and sustainably prosperous nation. Stupidity and short sightedness won the day as we bowed to the economic policies of, firstly, an inveterate gambler and, secondly, a fat charmless oaf. Now we are subject to the idiocy of another classic breed, a career politican riding on the coattails of his family name. Lenihan sits wide eyed and terrified before the cameras, the cogs in his brain slowly turning and struggling for answers to the consistent and terrible economic nightmare that unfolds before him. He is like a cross between Gollum and Tweedle Dee - fat, greedy, stupid, wide eyed and desperate. A useless fool with no credentials to run even a chip shop.

I can't move up here without sight of the homeless...they are at every corner and from every background...young and old, Irish and non-national, sober and fucked...just people. Their hope has now disappeared. But why should we care, right? We'll survive somehow. We'll keep going...I'm digressing but it is so easy to do so. The length and breadth of this sickening mulch of ineptitude is so broad it is impossible to focus on anything for any sustained length of time. Your mind flits from catastrophe to catastophe, each time thinking "How could they have done this? How could ANYONE let this happen?!"

I intended to write this about An Bord Snip Nua but where do I begin...Colm McCarthy is a calculator. A fool who knows nothing of the real world. Never get an aging academic to do the work of a real man...he has been so far removed from the real world for so long he has lost all concept of how it works. Our international reputation is built to a large degree on the artistic and cultural heritage we have created and yet that is where this oaf cuts first. Our economic reputation lies in tatters, now is not the time to destroy our cultural reputation. But this incompetent idiot will never understand. He has no concept of true worth, to him Ireland is a series of figures and columns. Cut, cut, cut. Is it too much to paraphrase Stalin? Possibly. But one man in poverty is a tragedy. A million is just a statistic...the books must balance in Ireland Inc.

I'm not really considering too deeply what I write. I meant this to be a jolly, fun little post when I started but it is impossible to concentrate, there is just too much... Suffice to say I'm angry now, angry and afraid. Get angry.

Most of Michael Jackson's songs were shit and now he's dead

2009-06-27T21:46:00.008+01:00

Listen, I am fully aware at this stage that Michael Jackson is dead. I am fully aware that he had a strange and terrible life filled with misery and depression and excessive prescription drugs and dubious sexual practices and bizarre plastic surgery and a partridge in a pear tree. I am fully aware that he sold a lot of albums, made a lot of money, was the King of Pop and moonwalked to the clinic to get his skin bleached. I have been fed so much information on this freak of nature over the past three days I feel I could write his biography (However, I wouldn't waste my time on such on enterprise because what do I care about an average musician who allegedly touched kids cocks as a hobby?)

News needs to be new. That is why it is called NEWs. He's dead three days now. I never thought I'd say this but please, Sky News, please tell me about the brave boys in Iraq. Please tell me about Katie Price/Jordan/Titty O'Toole and her wild soirees in Ibiza. Please tell me about something that is happening right NOW! Please tell me ANYTHING other than MICHAEL JACKSON IS FUCKING DEAD.

And don't get me started on the idiot tabloids. 'Fatso' Murphy and 'Git' Smith and fucking 'Fingers' McGraw... they're fucking criminals, not Disney cartoon characters. You useless, pathetic cunts.

I start with the best of intentions and end up riling myself into an intense fury. Still, nothing like a bit of keyboard heroism eh?

In positive news, Blur were "well kewl" at Glasto. "Wikkid"!

Riding scooters on vacation whilst listening to the Fall

2009-06-20T20:09:00.009+01:00

As the majority of my readership (which comprises of those I browbeat into reading this insipid nonsense) are not familiar with the 'behind the scenes' mechanics of Blogspot I have decided to compose a blog on some of the foibles of this wonderful little web service. Well, one in particular. Note the way I used the phrase 'behind the scenes' so as to conjure up images of Hollywood superstars and the global film industry, thus enticing you into reading this rubbish. In this respect I am like Heat magazine.

Let me describe to you one particular foible I always found especially unusual and somewhat charming. Cue boring exposition. For each new post I make I must insert a 'label'. The label of the blog must describe, in a word, what is contained therein. So a politics entry will receive the label politics and so on. "Very straightforward" I hear you say. However the kind folks at Blogspot, fully aware that they are dealing with legions of morons, have decided to give us examples...hm. Let me illustrate what I'm talking about with a simple JPEG image:

Always those three same examples. Scooters. Vacation. Fall. It is as if to say that we are such dullards we are unable to understand the concept of labelling. Or perhaps to say "You know you can write your blog about different things??! Here are some different things!" Nevertheless, it is a charming juxtaposition of words. For me it conjures up images of riding Lambrettas through the sunswept Californian countryside just as it begins to turn a beautiful shade of gold.

Anyway, next time I plan to write a lovely little story about the above. Now, however, I intend to watch Spain play South Africa in the Confederations Cup. Stephen Pienaar is doing a job but crusty old Villa got a cheaty goal. Bye!

It's a funny old game of two halves at the end of the day Bill.

2009-06-14T21:29:00.000+01:00

The transfer window. Home of insanity since...well, since I don't know when. 2009 will be hailed, however, as the years "things escalated" as the man said. I remember the good old days of the 1990's when Andy/Andrew Cole moving to Manchester United for £7 million was considered extravagance beyond measure. Now we have the boy Ronaldo and the other boy Kaka moving for a combined fee of about £150 million which is a substantial amount of funds by anyone's estimation. To say I could purchase a small country for that amount of money is of course a truism but the fact is I could purchase a fairly large country for that amount these days. Any number of African banana republics are crying out for a dictatorial leader to rule over them with an iron fist of tyranny. With £150 million I could be that man. Just give me that chance.

Of course, I would get no return on my investment save perhaps for a bullet square in the head about 12 days into my reign of terror. Florentine Perez, on the other hand, believes he can make a profit from these extravagant purchases through lucrative tours and merchandising. Perez benefits from having a well established brand under his command; arguably the most popular brand in football. Add to this the global superstars who ply their trade for Real Madrid and you have an extremely potent force in terms of global merchandising. For the romantics amongst us (and I'd include myself in that category) this era of merchandising is something of a blight but the business side of football is now crucial for any club wishing for success at the very highest level.

The other great club football brands, such as Liverpool and in particular Manchester United, make no attempts to disguise how crucial their business empire is to their continued success. Tours of East Asia, where Premier League football is hugely popular, make millions of pounds out of enthusiastic fans who will pay anything to see their superstars up close and personal. Eyeing that, the Premier League have made proposals to stage games abroad each season; proposals that have been met with disgust by fans of the league. However, it is the natural progression for the league; Premier League football is now global. Fans in Ireland in particular cannot be so hypocritical as to deny fans further afield pleasures which are relatively easily available to us considering that, for a lot of us, our connection to the English club we support was created largely through the marketing of the clubs and corporations in question.

Unfortunately, as the bigger clubs gain both clout and cash by selling out to the businessmen, smaller clubs and lower league football begins to suffer. We need look no farther than our own country to see the effect the Sky Super Wednesday phenomenon has on local football where interest and attendances have dwindled hugely since the advent of Sky's strangehold on EPL coverage. But I digress...

The question is whether these purchases by Real Madrid are extremely insane or extremely pragmatic. The recent past gives some credence to the latter. Real Madrid did it with Zidane. They did it with Beckham. And both times they made huge money on their investements, with the Zidane Galactico era bringing great success to the club and Beckham bringing in huge money in terms of shirt sales and merchandising. The ante has been upped as regards the amount of investement but it is possible that huge expenditure will be at least recouped in time. Add to this the fact the Madrid have hugely increased their chances of having a successful campaign both home and abroad next year and you begin to wonder is Perez more level headed than we think.

Hard to say though. Maybe Perez and his board are business geniuses. Or maybe Dunphy was right and they've been on acid this whole time. Fear and Loathing in the Bernabeu...now that could make some serious cash.

The Irish Greens Remembrance Society...

2009-06-07T14:19:00.000+01:00

...or how quickly promise can turn to compost. Over the last ten years, Green politics became increasingly fashionable in the Western world as the threat of climate change began to manifest itself across the world. Ridiculous hippies such as Al Gore (okay, poor example) bleated incessantly about poor old Mother Nature's struggle against the evils of mankind. Hip young thangs staged another one of these bloody annoying global concerts in an effort to heighten awareness of climate change (I think it was called I Hart Treez). And so Green politics came to be, as the kids say, "hip" and politics began to look a little bit green around the gills. Or maybe that was me, sick with the smugness of it all. Who knows.

Anyway, Ireland was a prime example of this Green shift. Economic comfort allowed certain voters the chance to support issues which, in the past, were considered on the fringes of mainstream politics. No issue was more latched on to than that of climate change. No party benefitted more from this than the Greens. Drawing support from the newly affluent middle classes and Ireland's youth, the Green Party grew steadily in strength culminating in a hugely impressive campaign in 2007's General Election. When the dust cleared, the Green Party found themselves in government with two parties whose outlooks on the environment differed so vastly from their own that it quickly became evident this coalition would end in tears.

It is not an exaggeration to say that by forming this coalition with the big business politics of Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats led the Greens to almost entirely sacrifice their ideology. The swift u-turn on their Shell to Sea policy best exemplified the sudden change that came over the Greens. Unfortunately, if you put yourself forth as an narrow interest ideological party - no matter what the ideology is - you MUST stick with that ideology no matter what the circumstances. The Greens, however, did not and swiftly alienated the voters who believed their policies would save the ozone layer or the greater spotted swamp eel or whatever other cause was in vogue that day. And, at the first opportunity afforded to them, those voters punished the Greens.

However, that is not the whole story. Economic hardship has fallen upon Ireland and with economic hardship comes a certain pragmatism amongst voters. Noeveau poor liberal voters who formerly aligned themselves with the Greens began to see the economic benefit of the left leaning policies of Labour. Indeed, left politics gained across the board with small parties such as the Socialist Party and People before Profit gaining council seats in urban areas; areas where the Green Party garnered most support.

In short, these local elections have been a disaster for the Green Party and the General Election, whenever it occurs, will punish them further. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that they will collapse as a party - as happened to the PD's. How quickly, then, that political promise can turn to shit if you don't maintain your integrity. But John Gormley et al should look on the bright side. At least shit can help grow grass.

It's a holiday surprise, and a bright one at that...

2009-06-01T16:45:00.000+01:00

Oh, how I wish that were true. Someone, anyone, surprise me. God lads, I'd love to go on a holiday. For almost any length of time, to almost any destination. Even though the Old Country seems positively Arcadian at the moment with azure blue skies and lush green grass as far as the eye can see I still feel an urge to feck off to some mystery destination. I guess I'm just a bit tired of the routine of life. I suppose it's sometimes necessary just to take a break.

It's a funny time of the year, though, and your mid 20's are a strange time in your life. The summer, for me, always conjures up ideas of jetting off to some exotic location to drink strange cocktails and fornicate in the sand. Whilst your 20's sometimes seem as your last years of temporary freedom from the stultifying doldrums of the 9 to 5 routine. So here I am, stuck with those two ideas in my head and feeling very sorry for myself that I'm sitting at a boring desk in a boring job doing boring work. Or, as the case may be, writing this boring blog. Sometimes I feel deep hatred for all my friends who've jetted off to Australia and South America for the year. Other times it's merely an intense dislike. Those hideous, tanned, despicable, happy PRICKS.

It's hard to definitively say WHY we feel this urge to travel but let me have a go for the craic. To travel is essentially to fulfil the most basic and primal of human urges - the neverending search. For answers where none exist, for meaning in a world that may, for all we will ever know, have none. We are all looking for something, an answer to life's unanswerable. Our innate desire to travel perhaps best illustrates that. Or perhaps I'm talking a load of ould bollocks, it's been known to happen. But I think mankind will always want a new frontier, greater lands to conquer, new horizons to explore. Our search will drive us to greater things as time goes by, endless frontiers and unreachable horizons far beyond what we can imagine today. But for now, for me, anywhere will do...well, except maybe for the Middle East. I don't need my balls blown off by some deranged Muslim suicide bomber.

Although he looks like quite a nice young fella doesn't he?

What to do of an evening?

2009-05-28T21:55:00.000+01:00

Here we are, a roaring fiend of a woman to my left, a hairy dithering lankpot to my right and me, poor little Joe, stuck in the middle. The beatings have now commenced, my harpy mate raining blows on my head with the fury and vengeance of a woman scorned.

I jest. I love those guys. They're both nice and sweet and the world is a better place with them in it. I'm patronizing now, she says.

Some people are never happy.

Hey there sportsfans!

2009-05-21T16:50:00.000+01:00

I wrote this on the Examiner website not long back, so gee willikers, I may as well put it on here:

"The truth about Irish sports fans is as far removed from the myth as it is possible to get. We have contrived to somehow create for ourselves the reputation as the world's greatest fans but in reality that is a total sham. The truth is that we sing when we're winning. If our teams are not successful at the highest level of their game then interest quickly dwindles. Unfortunately, the LOI suffers hugely from this malaise that affects Irish sports fan.

While 4,000 is an excellent attendance for the LOI it is shameful when you consider the overall popularity of football in this country. Whilst every man and his dog will pin his flag to a Premiership, or even Scottish, team the interest in the LOI is minimal. The barstoolers will point to the quality of the football - "I'm not paying 15 quid to watch that rubbish". Yet they will happily spend 15 quid on pints to watch the big Celtic game on the weekend - despite the fact that quality wise the SPL is not far removed from the LOI.

The GAA and rugby are often cited as the competition to the LOI but many (if not most) sportsfans (bit of Americana for you there) I know follow all three disciplines. Following one sport should not impinge on the enjoyment of another. If we look at it from a grassroots level and at the membership of local soccer clubs throughout the country we see the soccer is a hugely popular sport. But that doesn't translate to the LOI.

The truth hurts. And the truth is that we, as a general public, are only interested in success. Every year for the LOI is a struggle, some clubs like Cork City living week on week. Irish people prefer the glitz, glamour and success of a league in another country, a country whose sporting failures we then revel in. Hypocrisy? Perhaps. But it is certainly a very sad and painful truth."

Nothing like waxing lyrical over football.

Nothing Added but Balls

2009-05-21T16:27:00.000+01:00

I became very lazy once again and now, having at last found the time to type out some prattle for you darling folks out there, I cannot think of anything to write about. Ideas, as is their wont, have come and gone in the past two weeks since I last deigned to visit this little blog and now I am bereft of inspiration. What I actually need is people to read this rubbish and tell me that I'm an idiot. Such heinous slurs against my character will motivate such fury within me that my keyboard hero instincts will kick in. I will then create the most furiously beautiul, or beautifully furious, piece of prose with which to DESTROY the feeble minds of my Interwebtual assailants.

Instead I just sit here slack jawed, praying that the Gods will look kindly upon me and send a little idea fizzing down from the heavens just for little old Joe. Just a little one is all I need. I'm a simple man.

Rest assured, I will be back when I think of something. I swears it.

And a thousand cheesemakers whisper under their breath..."Edam well better brie". Felt I had to crowbar that one in somewhere. Oh dear.

What?

2009-05-04T20:32:00.001+01:00

The idea is that parrot society is very equal because of their constant efforts to achieve parity/parroty. And their women's lib slogan is "Polly wants a cracker." That's the general idea. I don't know what to do with it though. You work it out you prick.

Apocalypse Sow

2009-04-30T21:04:00.000+01:00

Oh my god. We are all going to die and there's nothing we can do about it. The cloven paw of Satan is leaving it's mark all over our doomed planet, from the arid deserts of Mexico to the crumbling ruins of our Western cities. Silence outside, punctured only by the lone siren screaming in the distance, carrying another of the plague victims to an early grave. A global Uniflu initiative fails. We are told not to panic but it is too late, too late for any of us. The virus spreads like warm margarine over the toast we call the Earth. Soon our globe is nought but a shattered dystopia, run by the few surviving mutants who have been chemically altered beyond recognition by this unstoppable virus. Zombie pigs roam wild through the deserted cityscapes, preying on whatever life that can be found. Then nothingness. Silence reigns. THE END.

We're not going to die, of course. But this swine flu idiocy has mushroomed way beyond anyone's control. You might say, huhuhuh, that, huhuhuh, the media have made a right PIG'S EAR of the coverage. Ah, I can't get away from the bloody nonsense. I will say that it is slightly scarier than SARS. I think that killed one man and his dog. Bloody newspapers. To paraphrase Hunter S Thompson, we shouldn't take any guff from those swine.

Leinster 25-6 Munster. The bandwagon is beginning to wobble.

I feel jaded and tired after bank holiday festivities. Mushy brained and woolly headed. Sayonara young blogees. KEEP AWAY FROM MEXICANS.

It is sad that a T Mobile advert fills me with such hope for humanity. Crafty advertising execs. They've got me!

We Have Ways of Making You Think

2009-04-14T17:40:00.000+01:00

The news, or what we once understood too BE "the news", has ceased to be. What we NOW call the news is advertising, marketing, shallow PR masquerading as things YOU MUST KNOW. News stories oscillate between mind numbing special effects, worthless bluster and sickening fear. They deliver us a calculated, carefully engineered message designed to make us feel X and think Y. And I do think why?! WHY IS LINDSAY BREAKING DOWN AGAIN?!!?! OMG! But in all seriousness all I ask from the news is the accurate delivery of facts. I don't want hyperbole. I don't want poorly disguised opinions masquerading as facts. And I certainly don't want a morbid deathwatch of a mother of two whoever she may be. We're slowly degenerating back to the level of public hangings. Still, there's nothing like a good TV war these days. Watch those laser guided bombbombs fly!!! Wheeeeee....

Death, misery and war have, of course, become the darlings of the newsmedia. And we certainly need to know about death, misery and war throughout the world so we can at least have the desire to avoid it. However, events such as the Madeleine McCann kidnapping case or Jade Goody's struggle with cancer are analysed to the point of filthy sickness. Tragedies turn into charades to boost ratings and put, as the man said, bums on seats. If no tragedy is available, one can easily be manufactured. War coverage, meanwhile, is often more akin to a Hollywood movie. HEROES!!! VILLAINS!!! BOOM CHKCHKCHKCHKCHK!!!

Through its over the top hyperbole the news media generates fear, anger, sadness - basic emotions - among its consumers. What the people delivering this news desire is an immediate visceral reaction from its viewers and readers - the delivery of facts has become secondary. They don't want us to think primarily, rather they want us to feel. To achieve this end, the basic reality of events is grossly distorted to the point where news stories read more like pulp fiction. Human beings become monsters, the world becomes a lawless wasteland, terrorists lurk behind every post box, no one is safe...no...NOT EVEN YOU.

In short, the news media has to a large degree ceased being objective for quite some time. Behind every carefully manicured story lies an agenda, be it political or merely monetary. Of course, no one is truly objective. But what any of us should expect is at least an attempt at objectivity by our journalists. The agendas of news corporations appear to becoming more and more overtly clear as the days fly by until soon the only news we can trust to form our own opinions on will be what we see with our own eyes.

There are, of course, bastions of objective journalism alive today particularly in the print media. But they operate increasingly on the fringes. No longer can we trust the mainstream media to deliver us accurate facts. Even the BBC, once the standard bearer for its news coverage, has gone weak at the knees and stumbled gracelessly off to the side of hyperbole and slack jawed idiocy.

Mass media has incresingly began to treat us as brainless dullards with the attention spans of goldfish with ADD. Unfortunately, no one has ever gotten poor underestimating the public and thus the snowball gathers pace. Not long now before we're a nation of drooling zombies. Still, beats thinking right? Right you guys?!

I highly recommend to anyone who hasn't seen them both Charlier Brooker's Newswipe and Screenwipe and Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent - both better analyses of the newsmedia than I could ever hope to put to paper. Have to dash. There's a Guantanamo Bay special on CNN about the lady who sews the orange jumpsuits to keep those evil doers in their places. Wow, she's just like you and me! Ahhh....

Peter Andre's Insania

2009-04-10T21:45:00.000+01:00

Christ this blogging business is a bit difficult to keep up with eh? What with the toing and the froing and the hipping and the hopping and so on and so forth. And so at last I return to Blogspot to update the globe on all the wondrous events that have occurred in my life... watch out globe! THIS IS GONNA BE GREAT!!!!

We're watching Hitch. Sometimes you look at your life and you question what you have become. Have I become a romcomming, Notebook loving, walk remembering PONCE?!?! However, I am told there is nothing else on despite the US Masters being nought but a button click away.

A lot of strange things have taken place since lost I posted on here. Very strange things indeed. A BLACK MAN has become President of the United States. A cancer victim has become the media's favourite bag of jollies. Liverpool Football Club played well for about 3 months. And I have joined a goat slaughtering cult that worships the voodoo snake god Damballah.

First of all, Barack Obama. Can one man change the world? People seem to think so. It is hard to think of an another time in history where such pressure was mounted on one man's shoulders. He is a powerful orator, a man with a strong sense of right and wrong and that rarest of things - an American president with a social conscience. But politics is a fickle business and we have to question whether or not he will have a) the time and b) the political support to realise his ideas. But whilst it is always hard to change the least any of us can do us try. For that both Obama and the American people deserve kudos TO THE EXTREEEEMMMEE!!!!

Secondly, this Jade Goody fiasco. I would like to prefix this by saying Jade Goody was, after all that's been said and done, a regular human being. She is neither a saint nor a devil, a princess nor a whore. But she died a delicious media product for us to consume, yum yum, cancer is fun! It's hard to overstate how despicable this whole circus became. I know this whole saga has been analyzed to death by all the usual talking heads but it is worthy of looking at. It is easy, as always, to blame the tabloid media for all the ills of modern society but it is about time we began to take responsibility. We eat this savagery up. Slow painful death, it seems, is a profitable enterprise.

Peter Andre was right. The world is an insane place.

Time is like a river, history repeats...

2009-01-19T03:32:00.000Z

...and I return to blogging whilst nestled neath my sheets. I don't know do any of you do that, I feel an irresistible urge to rhyme as often as possible in my head. Or out loud as the case may be. Approximately 7 months ago I started this blog with the best of intentions. This was to be my public little scrapbook where I would air my dirty linen in public for all the proletariat to see, to see how the aristocrats live and work and breathe. However since I have become unemployed in the intervening period I felt the blogs purpose became redundant. I am no longer one of the blue blooded employed, I can no longer lord myself over the doley tracksuits, the brandy soaked denizens of pub porches, huddling and clutching their cigarettes whilst watching puddles shimmer in the rain. Nay, I am but an urchin, a ragamuffin, an unemployed scamp. How did this happen? Well this little thing called the credit crunch intervened in my life in the past year and a half and boy oh boy did it take quite a sock at old Joey Geebags.

Anyway, it's not all doom and gloom. I am still, for the most part, ninja. Economic hardship does not, after all, affect ones innate charm and good looks - both qualities of which I have in spades (if not shovels). So life is progressing reasonably well. I am quite content. The air is sweet, the wind whistles my tunes and the rain patters most satisfyingly against my window. Jobs come and go my friends. Contentment is something that cannot be applied for no matter what the quality of your CV. And so for that I thank God, Allah, Vishnu and whatever other deity wishes for my gratitude.

When asked the question "Can you live without working?" Raoul Vaneigem replied "One can ONLY live without working." His contention being that work was a necessity, something we endured to survive. The essence of life, he maintained, was creativity, the antithesis of which was monotonous and sonambulant work. So let's hope I can use this brief period of unemployment to do something worthwhile eh?

And thus ends my latest blog entry, perhaps my last for some time. Who knows? So let's 'ave a noice little video to 'ave a laff at eh? Say what you like about Oasis and the Gallagher brothers but I challenge you not to admire Noel's attitude towards life. Adios friends.

In Cooba? Is no problem!

2008-07-02T01:10:00.000+01:00

I don't know where to begin to be honest. I don't think I've ever been taken by a place quite as much as Cuba. I suppose the best thing to do is give a blow by blow account of our time in the Socialist paraadise. I use the word paradise loosely - but not that loosely!

Day 1-3 (Havana)

Ah, there's nothing quite stepping off a plane and feeling a gust of hot holiday air blowing in your face. It's like a signal that the fun has begun. Always makes me feel quite happy. 45 minutes later I was feeling decidedly less happy when it was revealed that my bag had decided to stay in Amsterdam for the weekend, perhaps to solicit prostitutes and smoke spliffs. Hey bag, that's my job! Oh I jest now. At the time I was gripped by the cold fingers of panic. But once things are out of your hands I reckon the best thing to do is say "Feck it!" and get smashed. Which is precisely what we did, much to our financial misfortune. Not only did we spend a bloody fortune on our own drinks (a mistake never to be repeated what with 4 peso bottles of rum in plentiful supply) we spent a fortune on Cuban strangers drinks. Oh, such naive, drunken tourists. Never mind eh? I think it's fair to say we had some banter although the night ended with a drunken Jeremy Kiely shouting "FUCK CUBA!" to our fleecers. Mistakes were made but fun was had. It was a microcosm of my life thus far.

The next day we decided not to fuck Cuba and instead spin round Habana and have an ould sconce at the local scenery. The place is frankly unbelievable. It's as if someone plonked a Spanish colonial town in the 21st century. It really is a beautiful place. We went the the Capitolio Nacional (Jeremy is going to have to furnish the pictures) and I must say it's one of the most impressive buildings I've ever set foot in. The rest of the day was spent wandering around, taking in the local sights and sounds and trying to avoid being fleeced by the local jineteros (we succeeded). We had a reasonably calm night until we got absolutely plastered - but this time on the cheap! Day 3 was a little more laid back, we explored Old Havana. Old Havana has been completely restored by a joint Cuban govt/UNESCO project and it really is pristine. Certain parts of Havana are very dilipidated but Old Havana is another world. I must say that the dilipidated parts have a certain idiosyncratic charm though - seeing a Cuban family living in a giant colonial house that's falling to pieces is quite something. There is a definite beauty in the dilipadation. And we definitely had our best night out up to this point - we wandered down the Malecon (a sea wall which runs from Old Havana right down to the marina, about 8km) with a bottle of rum chatting to the locals. We encountered a giant street party and some very vocal and banterful Cuban youngsters. It was probably around this point that I really began to fall in love with the place. But the next day we were off to Veradero.

Day 4 - 7

Let me get the most important thing out of the way straight off the bat - Veradero has without a shadow of a doubt the most beautiful beach I've ever seen. Perfectly clear waters with a constant 28 degree temperature. You'd have to see it to believe it. The problem was there is feck all else to do there. We met an Austrian girl called Barbara as we checked into the hotel the first night. After consuming our weight in rum we decided at circa 4am that it would be a perfect time for a dip. Even at that hour the water was lovely. Nothing quite like jumping in the sea under a perfectly moonlit night I think.

We spent the next day lounging on the beach. Unfortunately the sun hardly poked its head out of the clouds for the whole afternoon - it was still warm but not quite suntan weather. Probably explains why we're still as pasty faced now as when we left. It's hard to overstate how amazing this beach is but there's not much more to say. After a few hours of general mischief and a few beers we hit the hay so we'd be refreshed for blowing 75 quid on a shite boat trip the next day.

Now I'm sure in the right weather conditions this boat trip would be wonderful. However, it rained all fecking day long. Well, not quite, but it was not the day for taking a boat trip. We decided to go for it because it was our last day in Veradero but to be honest I'm not sure it was worth it - I think Barbara regretted a bit because she was quite low on cash. We went out snorkelling (well the lads did, I think I went for about 30 seconds before swallowing a lung full of water) and then out to an island. Still pretty overcast. Myself and Paud decide to earn our money back by drinking copious amounts of free rum. I managed to maintain myself with what I think was a reasonable degree of decorum. Poor old Paud on the other hand - let's just say he fell off the boat and almost drowned. Still, what a laugh! The day ended with a dolphin show that last about 15 minutes because it pissed rain. I was too drunk to appreciate it anyway. But at least I remembered I was there, unlike a certain P. Ahern...no no, too obvious. Patrick A.

Well that's the heavily edited highlights of week 1. It's now 1.26 am so I'll do the rest tomorrow. Good news today - we've managed to blag free internet off our neighbours. Hopefully they won't password protect their connection. Fingers crossed eh? Here's a good little docu about Cuban hero Fidel Castro...enjoy!

Paradise Lost

2008-06-03T18:12:00.001+01:00

And so ends another season of the bewildering and intriguing action/sci-fi/drama show Lost. After a pretty lengthy downturn in the quality of the show it has really bounced back in the last 5 or so episodes and last nights one was quite the corker (in my opinion). As usual it left more questions than answers but if it didn't why would we watch it? No one is intrigued by a solved mystery, such is human nature. I don't think I'll bother discussing the ins and outs of the episode lest anyone who is reading this hasn't seen it yet (I wonder does anyone actually read this) but suffice to say it's worth a gander.

In other news, my efforts to get a Cuban tourist visa by next Wednesday are causing me no end of grief. Aside from their excellent hold music my dealings with Visafirst have been nothing short of infuriating. All the classic customer support failings are there - inability to get in touch with who you want to talk to, support staff who can barely speak English and a general mood of apathy are all present and correct. All these failings are designed to instil in my heart feelings of extreme frustration and anger, which I vent by randomly shouting out "FUCK" in the middle of the office. What a laff riot. Keep your fingers crossed and say prayers for me. Cheers folks.

I read today that over 14 billion quid has been allocated to the HSE for this fiscal year. That's 14 and NINE zeroes folks. Over 3 grand for every single person in this country. Think of what you could do with that money and now picture it disappearing into the voracious black hole that is our health system. It should really make you feel very, very sad because it is likely that very little of that money will be spent wisely. However, here's hoping eh?

I've decided to resurrect my old Last.fm journal entries re: Edison Sputnik which I never really kept going at all. In fact I did one entry. But it is fun to write in that silly silly style. This was the first entry. If I come up with an idea stupid enough I will add to it.

"Luna City wasn't what it used to be. A pit of depraved and debauched happenings, a den of iniquity - where the massage parlours were so conspicously legit they disguised themselves as whorehouses. Yeah, the good old days. Now, though the corporations had taken over; it was a clean, family friendly utopia. A sickening hole of contentment, legality and nine to five despair. I, Edison Sputnik (Freelance Space Cadet), stood beneath the pulsating red glow of just one of the thousands of neon Coca Cola signs, dragging the last bit of life out of my cigarette before grounding it into the synthsteel ground in disgust. Wasn't much work for a man of my skills in Luna City anymore - but occasionally something lucrative could crop up. Chances are the more utopian the locale the more lucrative the contract; clients in this part of Sol wanted to keep things on the down low. And that's my speciality. Fingers crossed I make the big bucks; before I know it I'll be back to the Outer Planets mixing with the worst this galaxy has to offer. Just the way I like it."

By the way, I think I'm going to the Cois Farraige music festival. The line up is only okay (Supergrass being the highlights) but at 80 quid for 3 days it's quite the bargain. Keep it in mind folks, website here but it's not been updated yet.

In the meantime here's Paul Weller's new single. I'm not quite sure if I like it yet. Seems a bit plodding but maybe it's a grower. Good night and good luck.

Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters!

2008-05-25T20:30:00.000+01:00

Whatever happened to the 21st century? How am I still being ferried about in petrol driven road vehicles and not fusion engined flying cars? How come our cities aren't pollution ridden industrial dystopias run by a single faceless corporate government? Why do we not have replicants to perform for us the most basic of tasks? Where are the shattered nuclear wastelands left from World War III, the mutants, the off world mining stations, the fusion drive space super cruisers? Do androids dream of electric sheep? Who knows? They don't even exist!

When is the last time you had a retina scan? Have you ever been roughed up by over zealous secret police? Have sinister women wielding laser katanas flown past your window anytime lately? Have you ever purchased synthetic foodstuffs from replicants in streetside carts under the glow of a neon sign advertising the very latest in advanced bionic technology? Do you ever get the feeling that we don't exactly live in interesting times?

If the human race had any ambition Earth's Martian colony would at this moment be rebelling against it's corporate overlords and readying itself for a H Bomb strike against Earth. However, something has clearly gone wrong and we are still talking about the Middle East. Hell, I can't even watch a lion in a sidecar race around a wall of death anymore. Where did it all go wrong?
Went to see the new Indiana Jones flick on Friday. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. It was pretty awful. I was a huge fan of the first three and have seen them - oh I don't know - about 100 times each. As you can imagine, I was pretty excited to be seeing this new one. Everything about it stank. The lame dialogue, the terrible storyline, the annoying new characters...woeful. The story doesn't seem to develop naturally, it just hops from one scene to the next. The Russkies just aren't as sinister as the good old Nazis. Verdict? I'd give it 1 out of 5, and that 1 is because it's INDIANA JONES for God's sake. Wait for the DVD.

In other news, I am going to Cuba. 15 days in the land of cigars, amateur boxing and state socialism might be just the revitalising tonic I need to get over this current bout of disillusionment. Still, I wish I was typing this from my 170th floor apartment as I looked over a neon lit cityscape, watching as the latest passenger cruiser from the Outer Planets docks in Cork's newly redeveloped Spaceport. Oh well.

By the way, if anyone can get me a link for Paul Weller's latest album, I'd be much obliged. And here's a video to remind you that it would be more entertaining if England had qualified for the Euros...

We wanna be free...to get loaded and have a good time!

2008-05-17T12:32:00.000+01:00

Drink to excess. Consume vast quantities of illegal drugs. Fornicate with almost complete strangers. Eat bad food. Watch worthless television. Don't exercise. Treat people you dislike with utter contempt. Listen to music very loudly even if it irritates other people around you. Coast through your workload daily. In fact don't work at all. Don't pay taxes. Ignore laws. Abuse pensioners. Punch children. Laugh at the disabled.

These are all things you shouldn't do.

How to Write Blogs and Influence People

2008-05-15T00:16:00.000+01:00

In order to fully understand the nature of this curious beast we call the "weblogger" or ("blogger" for short) I decided to explore the World Wide Information Superweb for other blogs of note, hoping to garner or "steal" ideas from them. What follows is a report on my forays into enemy territory.

Blog 1 - The Vacationist

My first port of call was a blog called "The Vacationist" by a pleasant sounding individual called Adam Sachs. I thought to myself "Hey I like vacations....and I love sacks....this is the blog for me!" My initial enthusiasm was quickly dampened as the site immediately crashed Firefox when I opened it. So far, not so good. Terrified of invoking the fury of the internet gods by reopening the page, I decided to chalk it down to experience and move on. Picture me with two fingers crossed and a look of intense apprehension as I opened:

Blog 2 - Ashley Wood

"Hm", I thought as I viddied the title of this blog, "This sounds like it could be the random musings of an attractive American schoolgirl - perhaps with sexy pictures!" As you can imagine, I was quite excited (no not in my pantal region, you sick freak). Imagine then my disappointment when Ashley Wood turned out to be an aging comic book artist. With a wife no less, if he was single I could have perhaps drummed up some excitement in my loins. As it happened, however, the blog proved quite enjoyable mainly because of the art work Ash had on display - some very good stuff. His actual prose was disappointing as it just described the art. "Some art form the upcoming WWR History book due in July" he might say or "A painting of a dragon." I felt I wasn't getting to know the REAL Ashley Wood. The closest he came to revealing anything of his personality was his giddy exclamation that "...ID Software is gearing up for Doom 4, which to me is super cool". Super cool indeed. Unlike you, my geekoid friend. Just kidding Ash, you got moxy and the art was cool so overall I was quite pleased. I decided that putting up pictures and stuff would be my next step on my path to blog domination. Buoyed by the strength of this decision, I moved with some eagerness to blog numero 3.

Blog 3 - Boing Boing

I said to myself at this point "Joseph, you devilishly handsome fiend, you're approaching this in the wrong way - it's time to go straight to the top!" And straight to the top is where I did go, my friends. Boing Boing is, according to technorati.com (no idea), THE number one blog on the internet BAR NONE! This would surely give me some ideas to help my blog become super ultra popular with the kidz. And man oh man, did my foray into Boing Boing begin with promise. The first headline proclaimed dizzily "Two FBI agents just showed up at my door for taking photos of Los Angeles!" WOW, I thought! So many interesting avenues of bloggery that one could pursue! The devolution of the Land of the Free into a right wing police state, abuse of power by those meant to protect us, the persistent buzz of fear that surrounds us in this post 9/11 world - all fascinating areas of discussion. However, the blog entry ended thusly
"The agents that showed up at my door were at first intimidating, but after they realized I wasn't a threat, we had an interesting conversation about the balance between me doing my job, and them being required to follow up on leads in their job."
Hmph. Not quite the global conspiracy theory I was hoping for.

In all honesty though, this was a very good blog. It had a good mixture of entries on a wide variety of subjects. Indeed, Boing Boing calls itself "A Directory of Wonderful Things" and it's not far wrong. Amusing video clips, funny pictures and interesting articles on any number of subjects make this a blog worth checking out. However, it's mainly based around other people's work - the author(s) of the blog seem to contribute very little of their own thoughts. 99% of the independent thought on the blog is from the commenters at the end of each article. As I started this blog solely as a vehicle for my idiotic ramblings, I left Boing Boing having garnered relatively few useful ideas - beyond stealing video clips from Youtube in an effort to make my blog more popular. Nothing wrong with that, onwards on upwards!

Blog 4 - Kahlee's Blog: Never Give a Cheerleader a Keyboard

After my last entertaining but largely fruitless venture into blogland I decided I needed to find a blog that was popular but that also had a more personal touch. And so I stumbled upon Kahlee's blog. I will not lie to you; the word cheerleader leaped from my computer screen with the intensity of a lonely farmer on a warm sheep - and with similar levels of excitement. Could this atone for the disappointment felt on entering Blog 2? However, my interest was also piqued by the blurb which stated:
"Observations and commentary by a modern libertarian cyberpunk on society, culture, politics and whatever."
Hm, could she be beautiful AND intelligent? A dangerous combination in any woman. The first entry visible on her blog was a poem. A very poor poem at that. However, it was a tongue in cheek affair and not meant to be taken seriously so I glossed over it in search of some delicious morsels of fascimation (fascinating information, that's copyrighted).

Honest opinion: it blew hot and cold. Her approach to bloggery was generally the same as I intended mine to be (random musings on a variety of topics) but, dagnabit, I just didn't find it very INTERESTING. This in turn raised a number of fears in my gulliver, namely that no one would find me interesting. I quickly realised that this certainly would not be the case as I am such a great and wonderful character (I'm only joking, I'm not arrogant, I'm actually humourously self-effacing ALL the time). It was comments like:
"Last thing I’ve noticed…. Everyone’s a hipocrit. Everyone’s a judge. Everyone hates. Everyone hates a hipocrit. Eveyone hates a judge. Everyone hates themself. They just don’t realize it."
...that put me off a little. A) Because I'm a pedant and it's HYPOCRITE YOU IDIOT and b) because I don't fancy that kind of self conscious analysis of other people. Overall though, it was pretty good. She talks a bit about music, she talks about politics, she talks a bit about sport and is, in fairness, for the most part reasonably interesting. And, perhaps most importantly, she says what she feels without worrying that anyone can read it. But the icing on the proverbial cake is that not only does she post hot pictures of herself she posts hot pictures of naked female celebrities. My friends, we have a winner.

So ends my research for today at least. I think some of the ingredients required for a successful blog are as follows:

A) Steal other people's funny jokes and videos
B) Be diverse in your selection of topics
C) Try not to think about people actually reading your WEBLOG
D) Post pictures of hot celebrities
E) Be a hot teenage American cheerleader

Achieving E might be difficult but I'm willing to learn. Anyway, time to implement these commandments. It's Adam and Joe with their insanely catchy Tokyo song - I recommend everyone download their BBC 6 Music podcasts! It's all good stuff.

Initial musings - Act 1

2008-05-11T14:05:00.000+01:00

I have finally succumbed to the masses and become an internet superhighway BLOG MANIAC. As with all new ventures, I approach this with a degree of trepidation. What shall I say? How shall I appear interesting and wonderful to the outside world? Should I rail against the system via my pathetic ramblings? Let's see. They say you should write about what you know, right? Very well. I am currently listening to the wonderful Super Furry Animals album Radiator. I find it tough to decide whether I prefer it or Guerrilla. SFA always seem to be doing something interesting, quite an achievement. I am reading Charles Bukowski's Selected Letters 1958-1965. As with any kind of compilation it blows hot and cold but there are moments of profound genius. Let me quote from it for a second:
"...give me men of apparent evil, for they are the forerunners of a future good - much of what was evil at 5.30pm yesterday is something else today."
I like that.

What else is there to talk about? I should never talk about politics as I rant but let me say this vis a vis the recent retirement of our Lord Bertie Ahern. There has never in the history of politics been a man who brought his country backwards under his tenure and was subsequently praised to high heaven until this idiot fool. That is a poorly constructed sentence but never mind. It sickens me to think of the money wasted, the opportunities missed. Every system - health, education, justice, economy etc etc - is in a worse state than it was 10 years ago at his accession. And he is looked upon as the greatest Taoiseach we ever had. There is of course no objectivity amidst the Irish public. He's a "sound man" and "a bit of a chancer" so the people love him. It pains me.

I try to write music from time to time and sometimes wonder what the best method is. Should I randomly pluck chords and words? Or should I sit and think deeply about what I want to write about? The initial method seems to work better as regards the quality of the material but it results in me forgetting a) the lyrics b) the chord structure and c) the song entirely. Unless I write it down immediately but I rarely have a pen. Oh well.

I was going to rant about a few more public figures but why bother. The devil might a turn out to be a pretty good guy if you could learn his language, drink beer with him and pinch his girlfriend when he goes to the bathroom.