AC
love from afar
10 years ago
Tuesday 30 June 2009
Business venture naming nightmare of the day...
Take one gargantuan Russian oil company. Merge it with one of West Africa's most powerful energy providers. What do you get? Click here to find out.
AC
AC
Monday 29 June 2009
Murraymania / Andymonium / Go away, please
Rack another one up for the guest contributors. Today it's Henry Birkbeck's turn. Henry runs a small business customising and painting shoes through his website leshouvre.com. Instead of setting up a petulant, moany website complaining about the world, Henry has done something cool, creative and hopefully profitable with his internet connection. Not that I'm jealous or anything. Regardless I'm not sure I can overstate how frickin cool his custom shoe designs are. Like 'em? Well order a pair of unique, one-of-a-kind, hand painted, individually designed shoes here. Mention you came from Hot Rant and Henry will give you 25% off. Anyway he's taken a break from being annoyingly cool to write up a little rant on the topic of Andy Murray:
Wimbledon – the ol’ SW19. Those currently employed (as well as those who just think tennis is a shit sport) could be forgiven for not being up-to-date on the latest from the All England Club, but given that I watch a lot of daytime TV at the moment, it’s fairly inescapable. This year is perhaps the most exciting in recent memory because Andy Murray, the very embodiment of home-grown Scottish British talent, may almost sort of slightly perhaps have a shot at the Gentlemen’s Singles title. Maybe. And boy, do we like those odds.
It’s not Murray himself who annoys me – he may be a surly, wiry haired Scotsman, but he seems decent enough. No, what gets to me is the press; the relentless broken record that is the British media. At least Henmania was generally tempered by an undercurrent of realisation that Tiger Tim was about as dangerous as a house cat in the Rajasthan jungle; his eyes desperately pleading for approval as he clenched his skinny fist in a futile display of faux agression before again getting whupped. But the general attitude towards this year’s ('Murray's year!' (c) British press, 2009) tournament is borderline ridiculous.
Plain and simply: Britain is not very good at tennis. There once was a man called Fred Perry. Sure, he was great. He won lots. He was British. Unfortunately for us, the last time he won Wimbledon was in 1936. As in, 73 years ago. And no British man has won since. And I know that’s a long time, and we’re all desperately hoping for a Brit to reclaim the men’s title, but seriously, chill out.
Murray has never won a Grand Slam. Yes, he just won Queen’s, but he has a much better track record in smaller tournaments. Yes, he got to the finals of the US Open last September, but in my opinion that was largely a fluke, and he still got pummelled by Federer, who last time I checked, was pretty bloody good. Again, I’ve got nothing against Murray, but I cannot stand the unnecessary hullabaloo that the press is making about his significance.
Case in point: Federer’s pre-Wimbledon 2009 interview with the BBC, in which they ask him (a) “do you expect to play Andy Murray in the final?” and (b) “why do you think Andy Murray has such a good record against you?” Clearly displeased by what he’s been asked, Federer delicately points out that though good, Murray played him when he had back problems and mononucleosis. In other words, he basically said: “I am better, bitch”.
Perhaps these feelings of anger bubbling inside me are not anti-British sentiments, but instead illustrative of my very Britishness: maybe this stuff gets to me because I know Murray probably won’t win, because Brits never win anything (except Olympic cycling), and I’m just trying to be pragmatic and setting myself up for failure. There is also a lot to be said for the rapidly declining British trait of not making a fuss about things. But ultimately, who cares? Really, I just wish Murray was asked more questions like those asked by Jonathan Ross when he interviewed him last summer. My personal favourite: “Are there people, who, because they look a bit funny, it’s hard to play them?” Now that’s what I call sports journalism.
Henry Birkbeck - Le Shouvre: Custom Hand-Painted Shoe Designs
Wimbledon – the ol’ SW19. Those currently employed (as well as those who just think tennis is a shit sport) could be forgiven for not being up-to-date on the latest from the All England Club, but given that I watch a lot of daytime TV at the moment, it’s fairly inescapable. This year is perhaps the most exciting in recent memory because Andy Murray, the very embodiment of home-grown It’s not Murray himself who annoys me – he may be a surly, wiry haired Scotsman, but he seems decent enough. No, what gets to me is the press; the relentless broken record that is the British media. At least Henmania was generally tempered by an undercurrent of realisation that Tiger Tim was about as dangerous as a house cat in the Rajasthan jungle; his eyes desperately pleading for approval as he clenched his skinny fist in a futile display of faux agression before again getting whupped. But the general attitude towards this year’s ('Murray's year!' (c) British press, 2009) tournament is borderline ridiculous.
Plain and simply: Britain is not very good at tennis. There once was a man called Fred Perry. Sure, he was great. He won lots. He was British. Unfortunately for us, the last time he won Wimbledon was in 1936. As in, 73 years ago. And no British man has won since. And I know that’s a long time, and we’re all desperately hoping for a Brit to reclaim the men’s title, but seriously, chill out.
Murray has never won a Grand Slam. Yes, he just won Queen’s, but he has a much better track record in smaller tournaments. Yes, he got to the finals of the US Open last September, but in my opinion that was largely a fluke, and he still got pummelled by Federer, who last time I checked, was pretty bloody good. Again, I’ve got nothing against Murray, but I cannot stand the unnecessary hullabaloo that the press is making about his significance.
Case in point: Federer’s pre-Wimbledon 2009 interview with the BBC, in which they ask him (a) “do you expect to play Andy Murray in the final?” and (b) “why do you think Andy Murray has such a good record against you?” Clearly displeased by what he’s been asked, Federer delicately points out that though good, Murray played him when he had back problems and mononucleosis. In other words, he basically said: “I am better, bitch”.
Perhaps these feelings of anger bubbling inside me are not anti-British sentiments, but instead illustrative of my very Britishness: maybe this stuff gets to me because I know Murray probably won’t win, because Brits never win anything (except Olympic cycling), and I’m just trying to be pragmatic and setting myself up for failure. There is also a lot to be said for the rapidly declining British trait of not making a fuss about things. But ultimately, who cares? Really, I just wish Murray was asked more questions like those asked by Jonathan Ross when he interviewed him last summer. My personal favourite: “Are there people, who, because they look a bit funny, it’s hard to play them?” Now that’s what I call sports journalism.
Henry Birkbeck - Le Shouvre: Custom Hand-Painted Shoe Designs
Sunday 28 June 2009
Tragedy update
Hot Rant is sad to hear of the demise, hot on the heels of Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson, of the US equivalent of Cillit Bang's Barry Scott, Billy Mays.
We had never heard of him before today, but a quick glance at his output revealed that he invested his advertising pitches with an intense, ranting, messianic quality sorely lacking in these parts since Scott (rumoured to be a RADA-trained actor - a rumour ignored by us) in his heyday.
Take it away Billy;
AC
We had never heard of him before today, but a quick glance at his output revealed that he invested his advertising pitches with an intense, ranting, messianic quality sorely lacking in these parts since Scott (rumoured to be a RADA-trained actor - a rumour ignored by us) in his heyday.
Take it away Billy;
AC
Uri Geller
The recent untimely death of the King of Pop has, amongst other unfortunate consequences, led to Uri Geller stealthily bending himself back into the public eye. Having switched on BBC News 24 to find out if Jackson was indeed dead, I was immediately confronted with the voice of the Israeli savant / psychic repeatedly stating "I can't comment on that" when faced with the question: "When did you last speak to Michael?" Pray tell, Uri. You were perfectly content to discuss your friend potentially being alive or dead live on the air as the news unfolded, but to discuss when you had last telephoned each other would obviously have been a severe breach of privacy? I suspect the real reason may well have been that even Wacko Jacko got fed up with the incessant pestering and pseudo-spiritual mutterings of this self proclaimed paranormalist. His presence so annoyed me that I spent much of the night wishing that his middle name was Nate. Childish.
Geller's resurfacing has once again raised the troubling question of what the hell his profession actually is. A cursory Google confirmed that "Uri Geller is most famous for his claim to be able to bend spoons and keys with his mind." This claim has always baffled me. Firstly, if you had psychic abilities to be able to move and bend objects with your mind, why on earth would you simply focus on keys and spoons? Surely this man could become an international force for peace and good by bending guns so they couldn't fire, blunting criminal's knives or even just fixing people's glasses when they got a bit bent.
This raises the very real possibility that his powers really do only extend to spoons and keys, which if you ask me is a little bit rubbish. I am struggling to see any use for these skills, except maybe for when you bend a spoon by putting it in really hard ice cream. Even then I fear his super-exclusive mind bending skills could be undercut in the market place by some enterprising labourers willing to just use their hands. To my uber-bitter unemployed graduate mind it all seems a bit unfair that he has forged a career centering around ruining metal implements that are otherwise quite useful. Then again I am trying to sell myself to employers on the basis of my in depth knowledge of Early Modern state building . So touche Uri... touche
A visit to Uri's website is quite a treat. Immediately unsettling is his cautious pronouncement: "This website could change your life for the better". Not will, but could. Furthermore, if you know someone who is learning to speak English as a second language it would be interesting to see what they make of sentences such as: "Spoon bending is just the tip of the iceberg!" It seems pretty pointless to go into the details of why Uri Geller does not actually possess psychic powers but lets just say that claiming to have made a Scottish international miss a penalty is about as impressive as me waving my hands at the sun and then claiming the credit for it setting.
But back to more pressing matters. In a show of remarkable attention-seeking in such a sensitive time, Geller,
*The Independent, Fri 26 June 2009
Geller's resurfacing has once again raised the troubling question of what the hell his profession actually is. A cursory Google confirmed that "Uri Geller is most famous for his claim to be able to bend spoons and keys with his mind." This claim has always baffled me. Firstly, if you had psychic abilities to be able to move and bend objects with your mind, why on earth would you simply focus on keys and spoons? Surely this man could become an international force for peace and good by bending guns so they couldn't fire, blunting criminal's knives or even just fixing people's glasses when they got a bit bent.
This raises the very real possibility that his powers really do only extend to spoons and keys, which if you ask me is a little bit rubbish. I am struggling to see any use for these skills, except maybe for when you bend a spoon by putting it in really hard ice cream. Even then I fear his super-exclusive mind bending skills could be undercut in the market place by some enterprising labourers willing to just use their hands. To my uber-bitter unemployed graduate mind it all seems a bit unfair that he has forged a career centering around ruining metal implements that are otherwise quite useful. Then again I am trying to sell myself to employers on the basis of my in depth knowledge of Early Modern state building . So touche Uri... touche
A visit to Uri's website is quite a treat. Immediately unsettling is his cautious pronouncement: "This website could change your life for the better". Not will, but could. Furthermore, if you know someone who is learning to speak English as a second language it would be interesting to see what they make of sentences such as: "Spoon bending is just the tip of the iceberg!" It seems pretty pointless to go into the details of why Uri Geller does not actually possess psychic powers but lets just say that claiming to have made a Scottish international miss a penalty is about as impressive as me waving my hands at the sun and then claiming the credit for it setting.
But back to more pressing matters. In a show of remarkable attention-seeking in such a sensitive time, Geller,
in an interview with Channel 4 News ... admitted hypnotising the late pop star to question him about the child abuse allegations that dogged his final years. Geller stated that although he knew questioning Jackson under hypnosis was unethical, hearing him deny the accusations while in a trance confirmed innocence in his eyes.*
FC and ACWell thanks, Uri. I hope that the next mega pop star to shuffle off this mortal coil has the foresight to pal up with a mystical maverick who actually has a job title - spiritualist medium, pehaps?
*The Independent, Fri 26 June 2009
Saturday 27 June 2009
Textbook rant
If you've seen it, watch it again.
If you haven't seen it, you're in for a treat.
"Do you understand? Do you understand?"
AC
If you haven't seen it, you're in for a treat.
"Do you understand? Do you understand?"
AC
Bear Grylls
Time for another contribution now. This hot, hot rant comes courtesy of filmmaker, raconteur and renowned cottager Fish Stock. Take it away, Ed!
Question:
Why is Bear Grylls a wanker?
Answer:
First of all his name is actually Edward Michael Grylls. Surely anyone who changes their name to “Bear” is a wanker. Almost as big a wanker as the late Conservative politician, Sir Michael Grylls, Bear’s father who was knighted in 1992, having lied two years earlier to the committee on members’ interests on the number and amounts of Ian Greer’s payments to him during the Cash for Questions scandal. Interestingly Michael Grylls managed to avoid notoriety unlike former Tory trade minister Neil Hamilton, who married Grylls’ secretary, Christine…
But I digress…
Recently aired on Channel 4 were repeats of Born Survivor.
Born Survivor saw Bear wandering around what may as well be Epping Forest, looking for discarded sandwiches to stave off the hunger when one of the 4-man camera team he travels with thought, for realism’s sake, not to invite him to dinner at the hotel the crew are staying at. Whilst you and I, and hopefully everyone else must realise that the locations are no more exotic than Windsor Great Park, we’re led to believe that Bear instead braves the Alps one week, and the fjords the next.
One particular episode of this insult to Ray Mears’ hallowed name sees Bear stalking purposefully through the swamps of the Everglades in Florida. Completely isolated in this most dangerous of habitats (bar of course the camera crew and rescue team hovering overhead in the Lynx) he’s forced to confront the local fauna by engaging in hand-to-hand combat with, er, some minnows, a handful of grubs, a baby frog and a turtle that looks uncannily like Dan Akroyd’s face in Coneheads.
The camera never actually shows anything that might qualify as a dangerous creature but Bear, not worried by this lack of drama, decides to add some of his own – by shimmying up a tree when he sees in the distance... bubbles. That’s right. Bubbles. He and the crew then turn tail and run/splash/trip in a most undignified manner, to the sound of Bear screeching “we’re too close! We’re too close!” To what Bear? A flatulent beaver?
When it comes to survival techniques, however, Bear is highly accomplished. “Lost” in this most forbidding of terrain, he needs to find higher ground. But fear not! Bear has a solution! He ties his shoelaces together and shins up a tree with all the charm and grace of Gordon Brown smiling on Youtube. “I’ll be able to get a glimpse of some pine trees,” he tells us, which is good “because they grow on dry ground”. He gets to the top, and shins back dejected. “I couldn’t see any” Oh, right.
Bear is a man who appears to hold the weight of the world on his shoulders as his furrowed expression shows us. He is clearly in danger every time he hears the breeze rustling through the trees, something he learned during his years at Eton. “The swamps are so forbidding. Anything could be lurking in the water”, he tells us, wading past some crisp packets and a shopping trolley.
Seeing the crisp packets has obviously made Bear hungry. The Everglades episode shows Bear taking a knife to a turtle and appearing subsequently with his T-shirt drenched in the unfortunate reptile’s blood. Later in the series we are blessed with an image of Bear snaking through a field of long grass (I believe they’re in Shrivenham) with a stick. Suddenly he jumps up letting loose a blood curdling scream as he hurls said stick ’somewhere’ into the grass from no less than 3 different camera angles. He dives in like a bored dog after his stick, presumably trying to alleviate himself from the mind crushing dullness that programming like this propagates, subsequently emerging with what can only be described as the still body of a young Elk, which our intrepid explorer promptly begins to hack at with that bit on a Swiss army knife for getting stones out of horses’ hooves…
Thankyou for the magic Mr Grylls.
But wait. Bear, old boy, I do believe you’ve led us astray! Although the title of your laudably egotistical programme is in fact “Bear Grylls: Born Survivor” one must look at the credits for a further insight into the production of this sham of a mockery of a mockery of a sham. My thanks instead should be directed to Kris Thoemke who is honoured on the credits as “Survival Expert” with Bear down only as “Presenter”…
Clown. Fish Stock
Question:
Why is Bear Grylls a wanker?
Answer:
First of all his name is actually Edward Michael Grylls. Surely anyone who changes their name to “Bear” is a wanker. Almost as big a wanker as the late Conservative politician, Sir Michael Grylls, Bear’s father who was knighted in 1992, having lied two years earlier to the committee on members’ interests on the number and amounts of Ian Greer’s payments to him during the Cash for Questions scandal. Interestingly Michael Grylls managed to avoid notoriety unlike former Tory trade minister Neil Hamilton, who married Grylls’ secretary, Christine…
But I digress…
Recently aired on Channel 4 were repeats of Born Survivor.
Born Survivor saw Bear wandering around what may as well be Epping Forest, looking for discarded sandwiches to stave off the hunger when one of the 4-man camera team he travels with thought, for realism’s sake, not to invite him to dinner at the hotel the crew are staying at. Whilst you and I, and hopefully everyone else must realise that the locations are no more exotic than Windsor Great Park, we’re led to believe that Bear instead braves the Alps one week, and the fjords the next.
One particular episode of this insult to Ray Mears’ hallowed name sees Bear stalking purposefully through the swamps of the Everglades in Florida. Completely isolated in this most dangerous of habitats (bar of course the camera crew and rescue team hovering overhead in the Lynx) he’s forced to confront the local fauna by engaging in hand-to-hand combat with, er, some minnows, a handful of grubs, a baby frog and a turtle that looks uncannily like Dan Akroyd’s face in Coneheads.
The camera never actually shows anything that might qualify as a dangerous creature but Bear, not worried by this lack of drama, decides to add some of his own – by shimmying up a tree when he sees in the distance... bubbles. That’s right. Bubbles. He and the crew then turn tail and run/splash/trip in a most undignified manner, to the sound of Bear screeching “we’re too close! We’re too close!” To what Bear? A flatulent beaver?
When it comes to survival techniques, however, Bear is highly accomplished. “Lost” in this most forbidding of terrain, he needs to find higher ground. But fear not! Bear has a solution! He ties his shoelaces together and shins up a tree with all the charm and grace of Gordon Brown smiling on Youtube. “I’ll be able to get a glimpse of some pine trees,” he tells us, which is good “because they grow on dry ground”. He gets to the top, and shins back dejected. “I couldn’t see any” Oh, right.
Bear is a man who appears to hold the weight of the world on his shoulders as his furrowed expression shows us. He is clearly in danger every time he hears the breeze rustling through the trees, something he learned during his years at Eton. “The swamps are so forbidding. Anything could be lurking in the water”, he tells us, wading past some crisp packets and a shopping trolley.
Seeing the crisp packets has obviously made Bear hungry. The Everglades episode shows Bear taking a knife to a turtle and appearing subsequently with his T-shirt drenched in the unfortunate reptile’s blood. Later in the series we are blessed with an image of Bear snaking through a field of long grass (I believe they’re in Shrivenham) with a stick. Suddenly he jumps up letting loose a blood curdling scream as he hurls said stick ’somewhere’ into the grass from no less than 3 different camera angles. He dives in like a bored dog after his stick, presumably trying to alleviate himself from the mind crushing dullness that programming like this propagates, subsequently emerging with what can only be described as the still body of a young Elk, which our intrepid explorer promptly begins to hack at with that bit on a Swiss army knife for getting stones out of horses’ hooves…
Thankyou for the magic Mr Grylls.
But wait. Bear, old boy, I do believe you’ve led us astray! Although the title of your laudably egotistical programme is in fact “Bear Grylls: Born Survivor” one must look at the credits for a further insight into the production of this sham of a mockery of a mockery of a sham. My thanks instead should be directed to Kris Thoemke who is honoured on the credits as “Survival Expert” with Bear down only as “Presenter”…
Clown. Fish Stock
Friday 26 June 2009
Micro ramble of the day
What a great combination of two of my favorite pastimes, and one that works to surprising effect. This is pretty much a representation of what would happen if you compressed my whole university experience into five minutes. A particular favorite line is: "let these snakes bite you for a little bit and they will make it all better." Medicine really did used to be mental. Although after reading Ben Goldacre's Bad Science, our whole feeling of superiority towards old medicinal techniques may be somewhat undermined by the fact that homeopathy is now taught in numerous universities. I'm going to put it out there that if you are a homeopath, or spend lots of money on homeopathy, then frankly, you are an idiot. FC
Thursday 25 June 2009
Internship announcement
The successful candidate has been decided! We welcome [REDACTED] to the Hot Rant fold! Although he met none of the employment criteria it turns out our fathers used to know each other. And his application was faultless. For all those who applied and failed here's what you should have done. As a humanities student at a top 10 UK institution, [REDACTED] is about as unemployable as it’s possible to get without being on various government lists. So we extend to him the false promise of future employment and the chance to acquire crucial workplace skills such as 'moving boxes', 'tidying up crap we can't be bothered with' and 'duplicating tasks for no apparent reason except finding you something to do'. [REDACTED], your CV will never be the same again. It's the perfect stepping stone to the 100ft vertical cliff face that is the jobs market.
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As certain members of HotRant staff have recently discovered, having a degree is no guarantee of gainful employment in these dark economic times. Our own Fred Carnegy has been luckless in the job market, while Tom Howells is being made redundant from an internship which barely keeps him in organic elderflower cordial and Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference sundried tomatoes as it is.
It’s a baleful picture which has been borne out (sans Howells’ favourite braised duck and focaccia bread) in newsprint: the guardian recently reported this year’s pretty grim statistics of graduate unemployment last week to a collective groan from finalists. For those too idle or too busy frantically scanning Gumtree, it also says that a similar number will be unemployed next year at least, if not for the next four.
Unsurprisingly, government ministers have moved quickly, mainly by making soothing wooshy noises and showy token gestures. David Lammy said quite sensibly in January, when this hoo-ha started, that a degree was still the cornerstone of many a long career, just in case some people didn’t think it was worthwhile anymore. Meanwhile, a giant talking egg prophesied that students everywhere would eat each other in the mad, undignified scrabble for even the most menial jobs. Or something. Lammy added that the government would be working with the likes of Barclays to provide graduate schemes for struggling students; because of course they’ve got 40,000 of those knocking around.
In any case, such bald statistics don’t really consider the distinction between graduates not getting their ideal job and not getting a job at all. The unpalatable truth for students is that some will have to slum it for a while in soul-destroying database tedium. For an unfortunate number, Lammy hints, it may mean they never end up in their ideal job. Then again, how many people in this country, nay the world, end up in their ideal job? The best advice it seems is to find employment, any employment, for the time being, until your junket in the Maldives eating Turkish delight and teaching Fred Goodwin’s children to do the Times crossword becomes available.
Then again it’s not unreasonable for graduates to want a return from their sizeable investment into higher education: let’s face it; it’s a pretty enormous waste of three years and 20 odd grand if you’re going to end up hurling dead otters at passers-by in some slave-wage Keynesian burlesque. It’s also a rather humourless irony that being the first in-take to pay top-up fees, this year’s finalists emerge with worse job prospects than their less encumbered predecessors. Personally I find it sad that degrees have been reduced to such commercial proportions: some now see degrees merely as a premium worth paying to get ahead in the job market. Most of the jobless won’t take consolation in the government's 'largesse'. Doubtless they’d rather be in a position to start paying their loan back, and be able to buy the duck and focaccia bread while they’re at it. [REDACTED]
NB. In a grim example of arch irony, we have had to redact the name of our former intern, as he now needs a real job.
As certain members of HotRant staff have recently discovered, having a degree is no guarantee of gainful employment in these dark economic times. Our own Fred Carnegy has been luckless in the job market, while Tom Howells is being made redundant from an internship which barely keeps him in organic elderflower cordial and Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference sundried tomatoes as it is.
It’s a baleful picture which has been borne out (sans Howells’ favourite braised duck and focaccia bread) in newsprint: the guardian recently reported this year’s pretty grim statistics of graduate unemployment
Unsurprisingly, government ministers have moved quickly, mainly by making soothing wooshy noises and showy token gestures. David Lammy
In any case, such bald statistics don’t really consider the distinction between graduates not getting their ideal job and not getting a job at all. The unpalatable truth for students is that some will have to slum it for a while in soul-destroying database tedium. For an unfortunate number, Lammy hints, it may mean they never end up in their ideal job. Then again, how many people in this country, nay the world, end up in their ideal job? The best advice it seems is to find employment, any employment, for the time being, until your junket in the Maldives eating Turkish delight and teaching Fred Goodwin’s children to do the Times crossword becomes available.
Then again it’s not unreasonable for graduates to want a return from their sizeable investment into higher education: let’s face it; it’s a pretty enormous waste of three years and 20 odd grand if you’re going to end up hurling dead otters at passers-by in some slave-wage Keynesian burlesque. It’s also a rather humourless irony that being the first in-take to pay top-up fees, this year’s finalists emerge with worse job prospects than their less encumbered predecessors. Personally I find it sad that degrees have been reduced to such commercial proportions: some now see degrees merely as a premium worth paying to get ahead in the job market. Most of the jobless won’t take consolation in the government's 'largesse'. Doubtless they’d rather be in a position to start paying their loan back, and be able to buy the duck and focaccia bread while they’re at it. [REDACTED]
Wednesday 24 June 2009
Red Mist a la Rue
I think I am beginning to be severely affected by all-encompassing road rage. Sure, everyone hates buses and taxis but, in a shocking lack of solidarity with the usually close-knit cycle commuter community, I have found that I now abhor nearly everyone on the road, full stop. Arriving at work today after my usual 6 mile commute through the idyllic dales of south east London, I was struck by the realization that, in a kind of red mist, my thoughts the whole way had consisted only of whether I should tell other road users to 'GET TO FUCK' or, more succinctly, just to 'GET FUCKED' should they carve me up, push me into the curbside gutter, walk out in front of me, or simply drift into my 2 square metre personal space. I have never known such rage as when a service vehicle blindly turned left off a public highway with plenty of notice given that I was cruising down the inside lane. This lead to intense gesticulation followed by shrugged gestures of disgust and heartbreak as my middle-class upbringing prevented me from screaming profanities and/or shattering his windows with a well aimed d-lock.I vehemently believe that anyone who drives in zone 1 who could be on public transport should be tarred and feathered and made to live rough in Covent Garden piazza at the height of the summer holidays (so, so many French schoolchildren). Pedestrians are really just as bad; I was once having a perfectly adequate time whizzing through Brixton on a winter's eve, only to have a woman consciously dawdle out across in front of me, throwing me over my handle bars as I attempted not to total the cretin. Incredulous looks abounded as I waited for an apology, which were met only by her intoning that "that's God telling you to slow down". Thanks, God.
And of course pinstripe business prick-looking obese men with combed back hair, who NEVER FUCKING LOOK when they step out into my path. Rage at situations like these is fine. Encourageable in fact. What is more unreasonable is the fact that I now hate pretty much anyone in my peripheral vision whilst commuting. Of course, we have the Guardian-identified Summer morons who find it acceptable to simper along the Embankment at 8.30 in the morning like it's rural Normandy in the dusky haze of a spring's eve. But it's everyone else as well. The fools with matching team lycra suits. Almost anyone with gears, and certainly anyone without a helmet. Girls on dutch riders who are slow out of traffic lights. The man on a single speed with too-full panniers this morning who was flailing like a maniac and still not going all that fast. Anyone who looks like they're going to change into a suit when they complete their journey. The criteria for my hatred is in fact so wide that it threatens, in a Rick Springfield-esque example of surreal self loathing, to encompass even me. This will, of course, never happen though, as like every other stubborn London commuter, I consider myself superior to the stinking idiots around me.
Couriers are fine of course. No helmets, or often brakes, but they are lunatics so it is sort of justified. Plus, they know how to deal with troublesome drivers: recall the infamous, possibly apocryphal, yarn of the messenger who, when clipped off his bike by a particularly irate and foolhardy business man, subsequently picked up his crashed machine and smashed it through the knave's window screen, a la the cover of the Clash's 'London Calling'. Commendable move. TH
Tuesday 23 June 2009
Never delete someone's World of Warcraft account
The wining youtube comment is this earnest inquiry:
straightouttanorwayNeither do I. The bit where he goes into the closet, then comes out of the closet and then tries to stick a remote control up his ass is rife with symbolism though. Someone give this kid a Nintendo 64 already. Actually on second thoughts this could well be the same kid who excitedly received the N64. It was a gateway drug. FC
I've watched this video about 15-20 times. I do not understand why he tried to stick the remote in his ass.
Monday 22 June 2009
Open mic nightmares
In theory, it should work. An egalitarian, philanthropic and optimistic process in which plucky hopefuls or seasoned veterans of the circuit take to the stage to either surprise or delight the expectant crowd. But the reality of the open mic night is so very different. More often than not, open mic nights are about as easy to sit through as a public screening of your parents having sex on the platform of Clapham Junction at rush hour.
So who's to blame?
Often, it's the behaviour of the crowd. Recently, an absolute shower of pissed, jiggling Antipodean harlots descended upon the bar at my place of work and decided to crow inanely about Home and Away (or something) over the top of the guest performer who, predictably, happened to be a sensitive, rootsy singer-songwriter guitary type. These awful women responded to the artist turning up her volume by indignantly ramping up their own horrific squalls. As if this wasn't enough, a bunch of estate agents (see fig. 1) were simultaneously holding court at the other end of the bar, laughing about how they celebrated ripping off a bunch of students of their deposits by playing a marathon game of soggy Ryvita with each other (or something). I had hellish visions of the women and the estate agents disappearing off into the night to furiously copulate with each other in a vomit-stricken corner of Walkabout. And I really felt for the artist.
fig.1
The performers, however, must also show a robust degree of awareness in judging their audience and surroundings. Screaming "RESPECT THE MUSIC, MAN! THIS IS ART" at bystanders who have the nerve to enjoy a drink and have a bit of a chat in, you know, a pub, would raise the hackles of even the world's most reasonable man.
Thirdly, and most painfully, there is no direct correlation between the gumption of a have-a-go open mic hero and their level of talent. Perhaps he grimmest moment of my life happened a few years ago when a drunken troubadour took to the stage and announced that he was about to salute his recently deceased brother via the medium of song. Thirty minutes later, after one chord played a thousand times in an ocean of tears, someone plucked up the courage to get up and put him out of his misery. It was a sad show, but that was no 'Try Not To Breathe' or 'Knocking On Heaven's Door' up there. Put simply: he sucked, and if you suck, the crowd or your own attitude don't matter a jot.
I fondly remember one hazy student evening at the notorious(ly crap) Brighton rock haunt The Hobgoblin, when another such hopeful took to the stage. He resembled nothing so much as a whippet-thin Lenny Kravitz who had traded in the former's legendary sexual appetite for a speed habit of similar proportions. Having taken to the stage after being informed of the strict three-song limit, ersatz-Kravitz proceeded to circumvent the problem by playing a two-song set in which each song lasted an average of 17-and-a-half minutes. His set closer, following hot on the heels of his set opener, was a shamanistic dirge, featuring the anguished mantra "All kinds o' cheeses!" (later corrected disappointingly, but plausibly, to "Bow down to Jesus!" by my friend Tom). Nobody had the balls, or heart, or both, to stop him.
This leads me to the conclusion that this guy, and only this guy, should perhaps play all open mic nights, everywhere. Either him or the guy below. At least you know the audience would shut the fuck up and have something to talk about afterwards... AC
(make sure you watch til the end)
So who's to blame?
Often, it's the behaviour of the crowd. Recently, an absolute shower of pissed, jiggling Antipodean harlots descended upon the bar at my place of work and decided to crow inanely about Home and Away (or something) over the top of the guest performer who, predictably, happened to be a sensitive, rootsy singer-songwriter guitary type. These awful women responded to the artist turning up her volume by indignantly ramping up their own horrific squalls. As if this wasn't enough, a bunch of estate agents (see fig. 1) were simultaneously holding court at the other end of the bar, laughing about how they celebrated ripping off a bunch of students of their deposits by playing a marathon game of soggy Ryvita with each other (or something). I had hellish visions of the women and the estate agents disappearing off into the night to furiously copulate with each other in a vomit-stricken corner of Walkabout. And I really felt for the artist.
fig.1
The performers, however, must also show a robust degree of awareness in judging their audience and surroundings. Screaming "RESPECT THE MUSIC, MAN! THIS IS ART" at bystanders who have the nerve to enjoy a drink and have a bit of a chat in, you know, a pub, would raise the hackles of even the world's most reasonable man.
Thirdly, and most painfully, there is no direct correlation between the gumption of a have-a-go open mic hero and their level of talent. Perhaps he grimmest moment of my life happened a few years ago when a drunken troubadour took to the stage and announced that he was about to salute his recently deceased brother via the medium of song. Thirty minutes later, after one chord played a thousand times in an ocean of tears, someone plucked up the courage to get up and put him out of his misery. It was a sad show, but that was no 'Try Not To Breathe' or 'Knocking On Heaven's Door' up there. Put simply: he sucked, and if you suck, the crowd or your own attitude don't matter a jot.
I fondly remember one hazy student evening at the notorious(ly crap) Brighton rock haunt The Hobgoblin, when another such hopeful took to the stage. He resembled nothing so much as a whippet-thin Lenny Kravitz who had traded in the former's legendary sexual appetite for a speed habit of similar proportions. Having taken to the stage after being informed of the strict three-song limit, ersatz-Kravitz proceeded to circumvent the problem by playing a two-song set in which each song lasted an average of 17-and-a-half minutes. His set closer, following hot on the heels of his set opener, was a shamanistic dirge, featuring the anguished mantra "All kinds o' cheeses!" (later corrected disappointingly, but plausibly, to "Bow down to Jesus!" by my friend Tom). Nobody had the balls, or heart, or both, to stop him.
This leads me to the conclusion that this guy, and only this guy, should perhaps play all open mic nights, everywhere. Either him or the guy below. At least you know the audience would shut the fuck up and have something to talk about afterwards... AC
(make sure you watch til the end)
Sunday 21 June 2009
The sad decline of Jean Claude Van Damme
A brief Sunday update here. This weekend I've mainly been thinking about the death of the eighties action movie. Whatever happened to films like 'Kickboxer' and 'On Deadly Ground'? It seems like all the main action movie stars of that era basically went bat-shit insane at around the mid 90s mark, consigning that type of movie to the scrap heap.
I think the majority of the blame for this can probably be laid at Steven Seagal's feet. His pseudo-spiritual arrogance led him to make a series of atrocious movies where he seemingly refused to obey the costume department and just wore his own clothes. He also got so fat he couldn't do stunts (cue many shots of his feet during chase scenes) and was involved in possibly one of the most bizare news stories ever. Apparently a dead fish was left as a threat on a news reporter's car and Steven Seagal was implicated. A dead fish? As a threat? At least a horse's head in your bed is quite scary. Not many people decapitate horses and it does leave you wondering how they sneaked it into your bedroom. But a fish on your windscreen? What the hell does that prove? Watch out, Steven is a fish killer. He just murders a fish, he'll leave a dead trout on your windscreen, without a second's hesitation. I don't even think this is in any way an illegal act. I also can't imagine that walking around with a stinking fish carcass, just in case you need to 'send a message' makes you a badass. In my head I have a picture of Seagal creeping up to the car in the dead of night, slipping the fish under the windscreen wiper, screaming "RUN!" and the camera then cutting to his feet as he makes a deceptively slow get away.
Anyway enough about Steven, I wanted to highlight Van Damme's equally acrimonious decent into insanity. Jean Claude has always loved dancing. I have picked three videos which symbolise his, and the whole genre's sad decline, expressed solely through his love for dance. First we have him as a young, hip, potential future star. Look at those moves:
Then Van Damme at his peak. Click the link to see this timeless scene from Kickboxer. Finally, the end. Possibly the exact moment in time when it became clear he would never make a Hollywood blockbuster again:
Sad times. FC
I think the majority of the blame for this can probably be laid at Steven Seagal's feet. His pseudo-spiritual arrogance led him to make a series of atrocious movies where he seemingly refused to obey the costume department and just wore his own clothes. He also got so fat he couldn't do stunts (cue many shots of his feet during chase scenes) and was involved in possibly one of the most bizare news stories ever. Apparently a dead fish was left as a threat on a news reporter's car and Steven Seagal was implicated. A dead fish? As a threat? At least a horse's head in your bed is quite scary. Not many people decapitate horses and it does leave you wondering how they sneaked it into your bedroom. But a fish on your windscreen? What the hell does that prove? Watch out, Steven is a fish killer. He just murders a fish, he'll leave a dead trout on your windscreen, without a second's hesitation. I don't even think this is in any way an illegal act. I also can't imagine that walking around with a stinking fish carcass, just in case you need to 'send a message' makes you a badass. In my head I have a picture of Seagal creeping up to the car in the dead of night, slipping the fish under the windscreen wiper, screaming "RUN!" and the camera then cutting to his feet as he makes a deceptively slow get away.
Anyway enough about Steven, I wanted to highlight Van Damme's equally acrimonious decent into insanity. Jean Claude has always loved dancing. I have picked three videos which symbolise his, and the whole genre's sad decline, expressed solely through his love for dance. First we have him as a young, hip, potential future star. Look at those moves:
Then Van Damme at his peak. Click the link to see this timeless scene from Kickboxer. Finally, the end. Possibly the exact moment in time when it became clear he would never make a Hollywood blockbuster again:
Sad times. FC
Saturday 20 June 2009
Hazel Blears – a life in pictures
Guest contributions coming in hard and fast now. Today we have Tommy T from the excellent cyclebitch.blogspot.com. Check out his blog for a heady mixture of politics, cycling and some vaguely disturbing revelations concerning 'Chafe-Ease'. If you feel like contributing, send us no more than 500 words to hotrant@gmail.com. And now to everyone's favorite ginger, pint-sized, tap dancing, motorbike loving, free spending, resignation tending, politician:
Hazel Blears has begged the people of Salford for forgiveness. Apparently they have accepted it – which is moronic.
Hazel is said to be overjoyed, proving that no matter how much “rocking the boat” you do, 30 years of hard graft for the Labour Party cannot be overlooked.
And what a 30 years it has been…below are some highlights:
Picture 1: Hazel as a baby. Calm and serene. The love child of Arthur Scargill and one of the Biker Mice from Mars.
Picture 2: Hazel in her youth. Bushy tailed and bright eyed, she looked forward to a world where everyone shared their nuts with her.
Picture 3: Teenage Hazel. Rebelling against the Thatcher Government, Hazel became a shrewd tactician and starred in her own feature film.
Picture 4: Hazel today. This was taken just after she resigned from the cabinet on the day of the local elections. As you can see from the photo, she isn’t bitter or smug, just ready to go back to the grassroots - championing causes on behalf of the people of Salford.
In describing her recent Constituency meeting, Hazel said the following:
“It was good. Everyone expressed their views and were free to say what they felt.”
I can only imagine how fun that must have been.
Tommy T - www.cyclebitch.blogspot.com
Hazel Blears has begged the people of Salford for forgiveness. Apparently they have accepted it – which is moronic.
Hazel is said to be overjoyed, proving that no matter how much “rocking the boat” you do, 30 years of hard graft for the Labour Party cannot be overlooked.
And what a 30 years it has been…below are some highlights:
Picture 1: Hazel as a baby. Calm and serene. The love child of Arthur Scargill and one of the Biker Mice from Mars.
Picture 2: Hazel in her youth. Bushy tailed and bright eyed, she looked forward to a world where everyone shared their nuts with her.
Picture 3: Teenage Hazel. Rebelling against the Thatcher Government, Hazel became a shrewd tactician and starred in her own feature film.
Picture 4: Hazel today. This was taken just after she resigned from the cabinet on the day of the local elections. As you can see from the photo, she isn’t bitter or smug, just ready to go back to the grassroots - championing causes on behalf of the people of Salford.
In describing her recent Constituency meeting, Hazel said the following:
“It was good. Everyone expressed their views and were free to say what they felt.”
I can only imagine how fun that must have been.
Tommy T - www.cyclebitch.blogspot.com
Wednesday 17 June 2009
Hello, New Closer Heat out now today, OK?
Is there anything that better demonstrates the cretinous cretinality of our burgeoning cretinocracy than the litany of 'celeb' magazines that adorn the shelves of all friendly news agents and supermarkets? OK, Hello, Closer, New, Heat, why do they all have one-word names that lose almost all meaning when suffixed with the word 'magazine'? I literally don't know whether "OK magazine" is a question or an all too honest statement of mediocrity. Meanwhile 'closer magazine' sounds like some kind of whispered come-on that would slip out of the mouth of a periodical obsessed pervert. Why do they all share the exact same disgusting front cover design, replete with garish pink, red, yellow and blue colour motifs?
I'd love to mount a scathing attack on everyone who has anything to do with these atrocities but I can't and neither can you. I read them, you read them. You might not buy them, but if it's there lying on a bus, train or in a doctor's waiting room... "But I never pay for it" you may cry like a fourteen year old kid whose parents have just found out that they smoke weed. Shut up. I was in the dentist's today and was drawn to 'New magazine' like a smack head to a big lump of brown. Inside I knew it was wrong but I read every bloody page, morbidly drawn to the seedy stories of Eva Longoria's weight gain, imagining myself to be above it all, smugly heralding my own superior intellect. Then came the creeping realisation that this arrogant belief in my own cultural eminence was a complete sham, I fucking loved it, every second of tawdry private life revelations, just like the sniveling 16 year old wanabee glamour girl reader I was taking such pleasure in deriding. I am a dick, I am ruining society. And so are you.
Now that's out of the way let's indulge:
Further lending credence to my long-held views on celebrity chefs, and reinforcing the utter banality that characterises 90% of these magazines' content, Jean-Christophe Novelli delighted the reader with the following:
Next up the current cover of 'Closer Magazine':
Seriously? You'd think that the old adage of 'once bitten, twice shy' might have applied here. It really worked last time! Poor Harvey. Still, at least this all happily reminded me of the episode of Peter and Jordan's reality show where Peter took acting lessons. For the rest of the week, during every conversation Peter would suddenly, and completely out of context, start menacingly demanding "are you patronising me?!?" After a few seconds of social awkwardness he would relent and proudly admit that "I'm acting! That's just acting!" Only Harvey saw it fit to truthfully react to this tiresome scenario:
FC
I'd love to mount a scathing attack on everyone who has anything to do with these atrocities but I can't and neither can you. I read them, you read them. You might not buy them, but if it's there lying on a bus, train or in a doctor's waiting room... "But I never pay for it" you may cry like a fourteen year old kid whose parents have just found out that they smoke weed. Shut up. I was in the dentist's today and was drawn to 'New magazine' like a smack head to a big lump of brown. Inside I knew it was wrong but I read every bloody page, morbidly drawn to the seedy stories of Eva Longoria's weight gain, imagining myself to be above it all, smugly heralding my own superior intellect. Then came the creeping realisation that this arrogant belief in my own cultural eminence was a complete sham, I fucking loved it, every second of tawdry private life revelations, just like the sniveling 16 year old wanabee glamour girl reader I was taking such pleasure in deriding. I am a dick, I am ruining society. And so are you.
Now that's out of the way let's indulge:
Further lending credence to my long-held views on celebrity chefs, and reinforcing the utter banality that characterises 90% of these magazines' content, Jean-Christophe Novelli delighted the reader with the following:
"I’ve got every single episode of Columbo on DVD. My fiancée Michelle and I were invited to go to a party in LA attended by Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. But Peter Falk, who plays Columbo, was opening a gallery nearby, so we went there instead! Sadly, he’d gone when we arrived."Why do I want to know this?
Next up the current cover of 'Closer Magazine':
Seriously? You'd think that the old adage of 'once bitten, twice shy' might have applied here. It really worked last time! Poor Harvey. Still, at least this all happily reminded me of the episode of Peter and Jordan's reality show where Peter took acting lessons. For the rest of the week, during every conversation Peter would suddenly, and completely out of context, start menacingly demanding "are you patronising me?!?" After a few seconds of social awkwardness he would relent and proudly admit that "I'm acting! That's just acting!" Only Harvey saw it fit to truthfully react to this tiresome scenario:
FC
Tuesday 16 June 2009
Organised Fun
Another guest contributor today. This time a Scotsman in Australia tackles the two word calling card of the drunken idiot abroad: organised fun.
Some people think that organised fun is a good thing. These people are wrong. One hideous event that I recently had the misfortune to learn of abundantly illustrates why.
The 'Big Night Out', organised by the Gold Coast Backpackers Association, is everything I hate about Going Out. (I must confess that I didn't actually go, so there is a small possibility that it might have been amazing. But I doubt it. As my friend Alessandro once said, 'I might be wrong, but I'm not.') On the face of it though, it's a fairly inoffensive pub crawl, sold to eager travelers as ‘the chance to party with your fellow backpackers on the most exclusive Backpacker’s Big Night Out in town!’ A reasonable sentence at first glance, perhaps, and maybe even an appealing one - if it wasn't a big, fat, stinking lie.
The Big Night Out is the antithesis of exclusivity. Surfers Paradise, where this extravaganza takes place, is a community that exists solely to service backpackers. If backpackers didn’t visit Surfers, it would be nothing more than a perfectly pleasant but completely anonymous hamlet on the Australian Gold Coast. Instead it is a bustling, mile-long stretch of high-rise hotels and tacky bars and restaurants. Backpackers made Surfers. Backpackers are Surfers. The Big Night Out is ‘exclusive' only in the sense that it is exclusively available to anyone willing to fork out the $30 attendance fee.
Amongst the things you get for this $30 is 'FREE VIP entry to four clubs'. My issues with this are twofold. Firstly, it's not free, because YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR IT. Secondly, VIP entry only provides a benefit if there is a qualification for admittance, some sort of, I don't know, EXCLUSIVITY. If everyone's the same, then there's absolutely no point. It takes 200 VIPs just as long to file into a building as it does 200 Ps. Idiots.
But some of the very worst things about the Big Night Out are those that the flyer doesn't flower up. Take the 'FREE group photo'. You know the kind: everyone strains to get to the centre of the picture, thrusting a drink in the air and forcing an open-mouthed grin in a desperate attempt to be memorable. They are completely charmless and totally naff. Look at you all! You sheep! You cretinous sheep! There you are with your stale, watery lager and your carefully unbuttoned Ben Sherman shirts and your whiter-than-thou trainers, doing your very best to have fun - or at least appear to be having fun - because you're supposed to. What a crock of shit.
Organised fun will never work because the pressure to achieve your collective aim of enjoyment makes it virtually impossible to relax. The best policy is to never, ever want to go out. That way, when you are occasionally persuaded to leave the comfort of your home for a bar or, God forbid, a night club, there is a small chance that it might be better than fucking awful.
Vincent Forrester
Some people think that organised fun is a good thing. These people are wrong. One hideous event that I recently had the misfortune to learn of abundantly illustrates why.
The 'Big Night Out', organised by the Gold Coast Backpackers Association, is everything I hate about Going Out. (I must confess that I didn't actually go, so there is a small possibility that it might have been amazing. But I doubt it. As my friend Alessandro once said, 'I might be wrong, but I'm not.') On the face of it though, it's a fairly inoffensive pub crawl, sold to eager travelers as ‘the chance to party with your fellow backpackers on the most exclusive Backpacker’s Big Night Out in town!’ A reasonable sentence at first glance, perhaps, and maybe even an appealing one - if it wasn't a big, fat, stinking lie.
The Big Night Out is the antithesis of exclusivity. Surfers Paradise, where this extravaganza takes place, is a community that exists solely to service backpackers. If backpackers didn’t visit Surfers, it would be nothing more than a perfectly pleasant but completely anonymous hamlet on the Australian Gold Coast. Instead it is a bustling, mile-long stretch of high-rise hotels and tacky bars and restaurants. Backpackers made Surfers. Backpackers are Surfers. The Big Night Out is ‘exclusive' only in the sense that it is exclusively available to anyone willing to fork out the $30 attendance fee.
Amongst the things you get for this $30 is 'FREE VIP entry to four clubs'. My issues with this are twofold. Firstly, it's not free, because YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR IT. Secondly, VIP entry only provides a benefit if there is a qualification for admittance, some sort of, I don't know, EXCLUSIVITY. If everyone's the same, then there's absolutely no point. It takes 200 VIPs just as long to file into a building as it does 200 Ps. Idiots.
But some of the very worst things about the Big Night Out are those that the flyer doesn't flower up. Take the 'FREE group photo'. You know the kind: everyone strains to get to the centre of the picture, thrusting a drink in the air and forcing an open-mouthed grin in a desperate attempt to be memorable. They are completely charmless and totally naff. Look at you all! You sheep! You cretinous sheep! There you are with your stale, watery lager and your carefully unbuttoned Ben Sherman shirts and your whiter-than-thou trainers, doing your very best to have fun - or at least appear to be having fun - because you're supposed to. What a crock of shit.
Organised fun will never work because the pressure to achieve your collective aim of enjoyment makes it virtually impossible to relax. The best policy is to never, ever want to go out. That way, when you are occasionally persuaded to leave the comfort of your home for a bar or, God forbid, a night club, there is a small chance that it might be better than fucking awful.
Vincent Forrester
Monday 15 June 2009
Interns
Calling all graduates!! Do you want to work for a hot new player in digital media? Feel the need to add the final piece of the puzzle to the veritable mosaic that is your CV? This job could be for you!
Here at Hot Rant we have decided that we need an intern.
We have so little to do it seems almost vulgar not to go the whole hog and make an intern do it. We have no office so you will have to be a self-motivated, self-financing, self-starting, selfless pushover.
Duties will include:
- Presenting yourself at you computer at 9am sharp every day (including weekends) in full Morning Dress.
- Spending the next two hours in eager anticipation.
- At approximately 11am, once we are thoroughly fed up with your grovelling emails entitled "does anyone need a hand with anything?" we will proceed to find you some completely superfluous database updating work. This may include:
- Spamming Charlie Brooker with pleading emails every thirty seconds for the rest of the day requesting that he looks at Hot Rant and mentions it in his Guardian column. Should he ask you to stop you must re-write the email in caps lock, up the font size by a factor of 10 and send every 15 seconds
- Copying out by hand the contact details from a 1000 entry long excel spreadsheet and sending them by post to Tom Howells (he does not like to look at long documents on his screen and his printer is broken)
- Something else totally pointless and unimaginably time consuming
- Every time you walk past your own kitchen you must make 10 cups of tea or coffee, in constantly changing variations. E-mail us what you have made and how many have milk / sugar and we will reply something along the lines of: "I actually wanted a tea with half a demerara sugar cube, three quarters of a spoonful of sweetner and 0.25ml of milk." You must then remake all beverages.
The successful candidate will be heavily remunerated, in praise ("Great coffee!") and will receive stunning references ("he was completely ethereal") for a cv that no one will bother reading anyway. Please send your covering letter; cv; references; copies of your degree, A-level and GCSE certificates; a note from your mum; your family tree dating back to at least the 5th century BC; a digital recording of your first word; and a baby picture of you dressed as a lobster to hotrant@gmail.com. FC
Sunday 14 June 2009
Row Boat Cop
Here is the first, of hopefully many, guest contributions to Hot Rant. We're really keen to get lots of contributions so if you think you could do better, equitably well, or even comically worse, please send no more than 500 words to hotrant@gmail.com. Today we have Jaime Madrazo on a literary tear against one of the banes of our country's fine river system.
What could possibly be awry about the Gin palace motor boat pictured above? Look at its strong nose and moist back end. Like Paris Hilton after midnight. Much like Paris Hilton it is what fills this vessel that is particularly heinous. Unfortunately for her it is a portly middle aged gent owner who generally looks something like this:
He is the true victim of my ire. Dear reader, I am about to convince you that the idyllic perception of these vessels is mistaken, and that this vile creature is of such low moral standing that he deserves to be counted even lower than the humble beasts which my fellow writers have so rightly disparaged. Deserving even of banishment to the furthest abyss of hell from which he doubtless sprang for extra time on toasting detail.
I make no apologies for the personal rarefied nature of this vitriolic shower of abuse. I take my justification from Ratty in ‘Wind in the Willows’: “there is NOTHING - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.” Who am I to argue with a fictional rodent used as a propaganda tool against the crass commercialisation of our culture; forewarning against the celebritisation which we so bemoan in the press and our every day life. After all, more people have heard of him than me.
I make no secret of the fact that I love a quick row on the Thames on a summer evening, or alternatively during a winter blizzard. It just seems unfair to me that I have to share it with idiots who believe that due to some quirk of fate giving them enough money to buy my family and then sell them into better lives, they are entitled to a greater right to use my, MY MY!!! River, than me. Were they there in the snow? No. Did I see them there when it rained? No. But come summer- ‘Oh yes its a nice day, lets go and spoil it for all the proles rowing on it , actually using the river in a way which doesn’t pollute, leaves them healthier and oxygenates the water for the fish, by chugging some fuck off motorised oil and petrol leaking excrescence whilst we have a few beers on deck adding to our beer guts and Britain’s obesity epidemic.’
Perfect. You do that mister in your 5 ton motor boat whilst I skim through the tidal waves you create in my 14 kilogram single scull shell, with its 30 cm wide look. And do you do you know what that means? It means that I can’t afford to take the time off focusing on not getting swamped to give you the two fingers you so royally deserve as you cruise past calling ‘Hello! Nice day for it’ interpreting facial expressions more often associated with suicide bomber level murderous fury as a desire for a pleasant chat and fraternisation.
‘By their own hypocrisies shall ye know them indeed...’ Jaime Madrazo
What could possibly be awry about the Gin palace motor boat pictured above? Look at its strong nose and moist back end. Like Paris Hilton after midnight. Much like Paris Hilton it is what fills this vessel that is particularly heinous. Unfortunately for her it is a portly middle aged gent owner who generally looks something like this:
He is the true victim of my ire. Dear reader, I am about to convince you that the idyllic perception of these vessels is mistaken, and that this vile creature is of such low moral standing that he deserves to be counted even lower than the humble beasts which my fellow writers have so rightly disparaged. Deserving even of banishment to the furthest abyss of hell from which he doubtless sprang for extra time on toasting detail.
I make no apologies for the personal rarefied nature of this vitriolic shower of abuse. I take my justification from Ratty in ‘Wind in the Willows’: “there is NOTHING - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.” Who am I to argue with a fictional rodent used as a propaganda tool against the crass commercialisation of our culture; forewarning against the celebritisation which we so bemoan in the press and our every day life. After all, more people have heard of him than me.
I make no secret of the fact that I love a quick row on the Thames on a summer evening, or alternatively during a winter blizzard. It just seems unfair to me that I have to share it with idiots who believe that due to some quirk of fate giving them enough money to buy my family and then sell them into better lives, they are entitled to a greater right to use my, MY MY!!! River, than me. Were they there in the snow? No. Did I see them there when it rained? No. But come summer- ‘Oh yes its a nice day, lets go and spoil it for all the proles rowing on it , actually using the river in a way which doesn’t pollute, leaves them healthier and oxygenates the water for the fish, by chugging some fuck off motorised oil and petrol leaking excrescence whilst we have a few beers on deck adding to our beer guts and Britain’s obesity epidemic.’
Perfect. You do that mister in your 5 ton motor boat whilst I skim through the tidal waves you create in my 14 kilogram single scull shell, with its 30 cm wide look. And do you do you know what that means? It means that I can’t afford to take the time off focusing on not getting swamped to give you the two fingers you so royally deserve as you cruise past calling ‘Hello! Nice day for it’ interpreting facial expressions more often associated with suicide bomber level murderous fury as a desire for a pleasant chat and fraternisation.
‘By their own hypocrisies shall ye know them indeed...’ Jaime Madrazo
Totally brilliant evisceration of The Streets by the wonderful Cassetteboy
The best bit: the cameo from the Pet Shop Boys at 0:57
I'm also, now I think about it, curious about how I missed the moment that Mike Skinner turned into Dr Tobias Funke...
And one more thing, here is one of the most explosively, diarrhoeically (sic) shocking pieces of music of all time. A massive shit sandwich, straight from the heart of the Midlands (also home to the horrible The Enemy). That noise you can hear is UB40 spinning in their grave and the bitter sobs of The Specials, crying for the death of Midlands music. AC
Friday 12 June 2009
Classics of Yesteryear Part 1: Swanchomper
The Daily Mail. Supporter of the buffoon, hater of video games, and purveyor of bona fide news gems such as this. Where to start? Treason, stabbings, nibbling, public disturbances, racial tension, R.E., ludicrous user comments... this high point in the last decades of forward thinking journalism has it all covered. Now, because I feel I cannot do the piece justice (and as I am at work and briefly unsupervised), here are a few tasters of the literary gold enclasped within the Mail's Nike-ad riddled latrine of a website:
"I was hungry, I had to eat the swan. I killed it, I stabbed it."
"But vets, who carried out a post-mortem on the animal, said it was unclear whether it had been attacked by the knife or Miah had bitten the swan's neck himself."
"Using a pair of binoculars to get a closer look, Mr Cuthbert watched as Miah picked up a carrier bag and saw the head of the swan topple out."
"I hate the Queen, I hate this country."
"Whats wrong with just eating a piece of toast or something?"
- Bev, Preston, England, 22/11/2006 18:50
Dinkus Morgan would be so proud.
TH
Thursday 11 June 2009
Slow news day?
Holy crap we're all going to die!
I was confronted with this distressing information while watching BBC News last night. Mars is LITERALLY GOING TO CRASH INTO THE EARTH. Maybe. Possibly in 3 billion years. The BBC even managed to shoehorn their favorite word in by calling it PLANET CRUNCH. Like the credit crunch with millions of deaths not debts!!! The word is literally losing all meaning, just add it after any notable event: credit crunch, job crunch, generation crunch, expenses crunch, swine flu crunch, Gordon Brown crunch, Ronaldo crunch, crunch crunch, crunch crunch crunch...
Anyway this is only, as they mention in the report, if scientist Jacques Laskar (pictured below) has done his maths right.
I can only imagine that this is a computer generated image of how Jacques will cope with the Earth/Mars collision when it happens: cool as fuck. Freshly crowned 'Dynamique' of the solar system by virtue of being the only remaining human, calmly punting around on his lava-proof gondola. "I told you so". Typical smug Frenchman.I have to say I feel slightly cheated. I love science and I like news. But when they combine it so often goes so very wrong. (for more see Ben Goldacre's great Guardian column). I got sort of semi-excited about the prospect of seeing the world end in a gigantic hot death collision. But it turns out it's billions of years away. I'm still not entirely sure what a billion is (a million million? a hundred million? a trillion million?) But I know it is a lot. Seeing as the world is only 4.5(ish) billion years old, it seems like an awful long wait. So thanks I guess to the BBC for mocking up a digital representation of the event that looks like it should grace the cover of a Sega Saturn game (why fate, you cruel mistress did you so badly want that console to fail).
Interesting as Jacque's findings may be I'm not quite sure how this made the news. It's hardly like this desperately had to go out at ten o'clock for the general good of the public. Stories like this do make it hard to defend science from the idiots who "don't care about it" and think "it doesn't affect them". Namely because this story actually doesn't affect them and even I am dangerously close to not caring about the small possibility of the world ending in 3 billion years time. Even less alarming was the more probable scenario of Mars coming "uncomfortably close" to Earth. Just like when your boss got on the same train as you and you hid in the toilets to avoid conversation. How close exactly would be comfortable? Anyway "uncomfortably close". They did a picture for that too:
The report ended with the 'stop the press' news that Mercury might also crash into Venus but that the planets would simply merge (WHAT?). "The new planet would be a little bit bigger than Venus, and the Solar System would be a little more regular after the collision, but the Earth's orbit would not be affected." Phew. FC
Wednesday 10 June 2009
A watershed fortnight for twats across the country.
Due to time-consuming work commitments, and a burgeoning, yet thoroughly impotent, rage directed at so many things all at once, this will read as a rant in its purest sense: forget rationality or cohesion of argument. Any correct grammar can be taken as a bonus.
If you are a twat, then this has surely been a watershed couple of weeks for you.
Firstly, poetry twats countrywide could revel in the pointless non-story about some sad old jackass (who may or may not have starred alongside a blooming Max Branning in a 1989 Yellow Pages ad) who initiated a smear campaign against another poet. Guys, calm down - this is poetry. Nobody cares. TWATS.
Then came the dawn of yet another series of the interminable Big Brother - a veritable haven for twats and twat-lovers alike. And the first eviction is always the worst, because the preening nonce that gets the chop always says something along the lines of "I didn't want to win. I came here for the experience" - BOLLOCKS! YOU'RE LYING! YOU TWAT!
Real twats will enjoy the news of the BNP's ascension to claiming two MEP seats in the European elections. Political analysis or debate is not necessary here: the BNP are a racist, thick organisation. And their success here may ultimately be a blessing in disguise, because, with the bigger stage afforded them, they should now have to face more rigorous policy questioning, to which they will have no answers. Because they are TWATS. Just look at this TWAT's face. I wish he'd been strangled at birth. And then ground up like shitty pepper.
And when we thought there might a nationwide drying up of twats, along comes another. Bob Crow of RMT, with his ridiculous tube-striking antics. Doctors, nurses and teachers who earn far less than your salary are obstructed from doing their day's work because you want more than your 30k (min) salary, and a ban on future redundancies, in the time of a recession. TWAT TWAT TWAT.
At this moment in time, it might be nice of me to introduce some light and shade into the article, and suggest that, in the grand scheme of things, what with the reawakening of the nuclear threat, the AIDS crisis, predicted record levels of unemployment for this year's graduate students, this doesn't really matter too much.
But I'm not. Bob Crow - you are a selfish, bullying twat. Fuck off. I hate you and your childish strike. TWAT.
With this is mind, there is literally no better time to introduce/remind the reader of the majestic 'London Underground Song' by Adam Kay and Suman Biswas (...me neither)
Enjoy AC
If you are a twat, then this has surely been a watershed couple of weeks for you.
Firstly, poetry twats countrywide could revel in the pointless non-story about some sad old jackass (who may or may not have starred alongside a blooming Max Branning in a 1989 Yellow Pages ad) who initiated a smear campaign against another poet. Guys, calm down - this is poetry. Nobody cares. TWATS.
Then came the dawn of yet another series of the interminable Big Brother - a veritable haven for twats and twat-lovers alike. And the first eviction is always the worst, because the preening nonce that gets the chop always says something along the lines of "I didn't want to win. I came here for the experience" - BOLLOCKS! YOU'RE LYING! YOU TWAT!
Real twats will enjoy the news of the BNP's ascension to claiming two MEP seats in the European elections. Political analysis or debate is not necessary here: the BNP are a racist, thick organisation. And their success here may ultimately be a blessing in disguise, because, with the bigger stage afforded them, they should now have to face more rigorous policy questioning, to which they will have no answers. Because they are TWATS. Just look at this TWAT's face. I wish he'd been strangled at birth. And then ground up like shitty pepper.And when we thought there might a nationwide drying up of twats, along comes another. Bob Crow of RMT, with his ridiculous tube-striking antics. Doctors, nurses and teachers who earn far less than your salary are obstructed from doing their day's work because you want more than your 30k (min) salary, and a ban on future redundancies, in the time of a recession. TWAT TWAT TWAT.
At this moment in time, it might be nice of me to introduce some light and shade into the article, and suggest that, in the grand scheme of things, what with the reawakening of the nuclear threat, the AIDS crisis, predicted record levels of unemployment for this year's graduate students, this doesn't really matter too much.
But I'm not. Bob Crow - you are a selfish, bullying twat. Fuck off. I hate you and your childish strike. TWAT.
With this is mind, there is literally no better time to introduce/remind the reader of the majestic 'London Underground Song' by Adam Kay and Suman Biswas (...me neither)
Enjoy AC
Alligator Snapping Turtle update. Part 2
Tom?
"Don't ever trust them". Wise words. Although this is a man who knocked his front teeth out with a chainsaw. How do you even do that? FC
"Don't ever trust them". Wise words. Although this is a man who knocked his front teeth out with a chainsaw. How do you even do that? FC
Alligator Snappers Update
Just to prove it's not just ne'er-do-well idiot-papers jumping on the hype here. Found this nice little inclusion in a Times article entitled 'My Top 10 Dangerous Animals Encounters'. Good work Richard Conniff, you insane lunatic. I think it's fair to say we are officially backing the man's book. TH
Monday 8 June 2009
Animals That Should Get Extinct, Part 2: Spiders That Jump And Bark
Afternoon rageaholics. Part two of our series concerning species of animals that should just stop it concerns that traditional eight legged bugbear, the Spider. I hate them, you hate them, the Pope hates them, Gadaffi probably LOVES them. Whatever, as living creatures they suck it hard. Even more so than crabs (that is a big one to come in a few weeks), they appear to have been designed by some mischevious deital hand more interested in pissing people off with miniature free-roaming monster beasts than creating useful beings like Labrador Retrievers and the cutesy lizards you always see on holiday in the Med. I once had one so large and hairy in my family home that I had to call down a friend on leave from the army, and even he didn't know what to do with it. Luckily for both of us (and the pair of over-excited young ladies we were protecting from a most heinous threat of repulsion), we managed to swiftly sweep it from the wall with a rolled up copy of the Guardian, whereupon the faithful family Labrador (as if my earlier point of their brilliantine existence needed proving) devoured the hellspawn bastard in seconds. Disgusting to behold, yes, but also strangely satisfying. Good work, Sweep.
This rant, though, looks to take our understanding of the need to destroy arachnids one step further, with a few examples of heightened horrors our arachnid nemesi can perpetrate. To the southern hemisphere we depart.
Firstly, and with the least proof as I DEFINITELY SAW THIS ON THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL but can't for the life of me find anything on Google apart from 50's horror films, there is an island in the Pacific, a bit Papillon but for all that is good and pure in the world, called Spider Island. This small land mass is, as one might guess, literally covered in the diabolical fiends. And I mean truly covered. It is said that one tree can hold over a thousand species of spider. Just thinking about this makes me feel quite wretched. How they got there, nobody knows. Why local armed forces dont bomb the life out the place, no on can quite understand. Thousands of miles away or not, I would happily see my tax money go on destroying it.
Next, to Papua New Guinea, the deadly land of Raskols, murderous gang rapes, witch burnings, cannibal tribes and unmapped jungle. "Jesus god, if only they did a 'I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here Or I Will Literally Be Dead By Sundown' here" one might exclaim. Add a new scourge to this list. Not one, not ten, but FIFTY BRAND NEW SPECIES OF JUMPING SPIDER. Why is there even one kind of jumping spider! JUST WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE??? I truly, truly feel for the poor intern who was baited up to discover this, presuming that something has to be leapt upon to discern all this.
Finally, and most skin-crawlingly of all, I must direct your attention to a recent story run in the Times of London concerning an unfortunate Outback Australian town overrun by killer Tarantulas. The more biologically aware of you may already be privy to the fact that these hairy rogues are not, despite their appalling appearance, particularly dangerous. And whilst these infiltrators couldn't kill a grown human, they will annihilate a dog in one bite and make a child very queasy. "Okay," I hear you all murmur "That is all fine and good, but why has this example been granted the apex of such a learned discussion?". Because, dear reader, of one salient fact. One even worse than the fact that these stinkers are huge and almost certainly disparaging of Holy faiths. Or that they had the terrible uncouth manners and initiative to invade a poor, defenseless outback hamlet. No, the key reason they need a good, hard nuking is because when aggressed they hiss and BARK. LIKE CERBERUS. I can barely even think about it. The image of a leviathon arachnid baring it's fangs and barking is just too foul to contemplate. If everyone is getting a bit perturbed over the madman Kim Jong-Il's love affair with living in a dream world and manufacturing nuclear weapons, they should just kill two birds (or a million spiders) with one warhead and appease him by allowing a free reign on nuking the crap out of this town. It'd be great. Like the best film ever. Arachnophobia crossed with Star Wars. He loves Hollywood blockbusters, we hate spiders. TH
Thursday 4 June 2009
Points based immigration system
Sometimes I get so angry about stuff I find it physically impossible to express myself coherently. The red mist comes down and I just blurt out unconnected swear words like some kind of Norse Berseker in the heat of battle. Or maybe more like a middle class, 23 year old Berseker, living at home, who's actually swearing at a newspaper in the comfort of his own kitchen. Slightly embarrassed by the presence of his parents. Nonetheless I had one of those moments yesterday as I read a story about our new points based immigration system in the Times. Full article HERE.
Following in the rich tradition of the government making laws that end up criminalising or discriminating against a huge majority of innocent people, in various misguided attempts to catch or stop people whose media-hyped threat to society has been exaggerated beyond any reasonable level, they have engineered an immigration system that stops artists and academics from coming to this country to perform or lecture. Amongst other outrages detailed in the article, the Ballet Russe in Swansea faces closure because their Russian dancers can't get visas. The director claims that:
Look at him, he's like an overgrown blind baby tramp with a bald head and a beard. By definition: harmless.
Admittedly there have been some successes: Allisson Crowe, the aurally challenging, female version of Daniel Powter, was banned from entering the UK. But even she didn't deserve to be detained, have her passport stamped 'barred from entry' and then deported all because she lacked a letter of sponsorship. Especially when they have repeatedly allowed fellow Canadian Alanis Morrissette in the country despite various please from yours truly.
Another Canadian, this time a journalist, was also threatened with deportation to Morrocco before eventually being returned to Canada. What's the big deal with Canadians? Are we living in some kind of real life verison of South Park? Actually our lawmakers could probably do with sitting down and watching the South Park movie; seeing as it demonstrates the disastrous consequences of governments acting solely on the basis of reactionary popular outrage and news coverage. I do feel that sometimes, amongst all the simplistic, illogical and baseless cries of 'Britain is full', people need reminding that IMMIGRATION IS ACTUALLY A GOOD THING. FC
Following in the rich tradition of the government making laws that end up criminalising or discriminating against a huge majority of innocent people, in various misguided attempts to catch or stop people whose media-hyped threat to society has been exaggerated beyond any reasonable level, they have engineered an immigration system that stops artists and academics from coming to this country to perform or lecture. Amongst other outrages detailed in the article, the Ballet Russe in Swansea faces closure because their Russian dancers can't get visas. The director claims that:
"The authorities raised endless problems ranging from whether or not the concept of “Russian Classical Ballet” even existed, to suggestions that we should advertise the “vacancies” in a national newspaper"Advertise in a national newspaper? It's the Ballet Russe you Fokin & Gorsky denying ignoramuses. On a more personal note, even before these new unfair stringent measures, Dan Deacon was stopped from entering the country to perform at Field Day. He was literally the only reason I bought tickets. I had to endure one of the most depressing days ever, including: crap bands, rain, massive queues for the toilet, and beer I could not afford, all the while trying not to cry in front of my girlfriend because I was so sad about missing Dan Deacon. And why? Because our border authority thought it would be dangerous to let this man in the country:
Look at him, he's like an overgrown blind baby tramp with a bald head and a beard. By definition: harmless.
Admittedly there have been some successes: Allisson Crowe, the aurally challenging, female version of Daniel Powter, was banned from entering the UK. But even she didn't deserve to be detained, have her passport stamped 'barred from entry' and then deported all because she lacked a letter of sponsorship. Especially when they have repeatedly allowed fellow Canadian Alanis Morrissette in the country despite various please from yours truly.
Another Canadian, this time a journalist, was also threatened with deportation to Morrocco before eventually being returned to Canada. What's the big deal with Canadians? Are we living in some kind of real life verison of South Park? Actually our lawmakers could probably do with sitting down and watching the South Park movie; seeing as it demonstrates the disastrous consequences of governments acting solely on the basis of reactionary popular outrage and news coverage. I do feel that sometimes, amongst all the simplistic, illogical and baseless cries of 'Britain is full', people need reminding that IMMIGRATION IS ACTUALLY A GOOD THING. FC
Wednesday 3 June 2009
I see your true colours shining through. I see your true colours, and that's why I love etc...
Richard Keys, the poster boy for even-tempered, corporate, football-presenting square-heads with jaw-droppingly hairy hands worldwide momentarily loses his cool in a comically sarky manner. Enjoy.
"Yeah see ya. Daft little ground. Silly game. Fuck off."
P.S. I have made this better for myself by imagining that at 0:16, Keys goes on a silent offensive overdrive, including liberal use of the c-word
And does he, at one point, really say "Nae promos", in a cod-Scottish manner? AC
"Yeah see ya. Daft little ground. Silly game. Fuck off."
P.S. I have made this better for myself by imagining that at 0:16, Keys goes on a silent offensive overdrive, including liberal use of the c-word
And does he, at one point, really say "Nae promos", in a cod-Scottish manner? AC
Phoenix- 1901
This is not a post of rage, or bitter cynicism. It is a declaration of confusion.
As stated in my Jordy post all those moons ago, I like French new-popsters Phoenix an awful lot. It's Never Been Like That was a fine, fine album. Take that, cut the weaker tracks, up the anthemic appeal of its best tracks (Consolation Prizes and the title track particularly), squeeze in a bit more synth, times by eleven, and what do you get? Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, the band's damn near faultless uber-recent record. "STOP YOUR FAWNING!" i hear you yell. The point i am coming to is that the album's first single, 1901, is causing me actual disorientation due to it's sheer, unrelenting brilliance. To the point where i have stopped working to write this as i can't think about anything else. It's like a goddamn work of art. A good one. Like a Reubens. It's perfectly executed and completely thrilling. Not quite as full of sex and violence as a Reubens of course (it's French soft rock after all) but that's just the first thing that came to mind. The chord change in the bridge is just one of the finest things ever to grace my young ears. The bit where the synth rolls out under it's first repetition. Faultless. And the chorus. And verses. And the grand climax with the lovely delay swathed guitar lines. Good god. Added to the fact that Fleetwood Mac have announced that they are touring with the Rumours lineup in the UK (oh Buckingham...) and I think it's safe to say work is over for the day for lightheaded elation. TH
Tuesday 2 June 2009
People who use the phrase "it's a free country"
I'm really a big fan of the whole 'free country' thing. I'm quite proud (hopefully un-jingoistically) of Britain's long history of parliamentary democracy, universal adult suffrage, freedom of speech, freedom of the press; and the unavoidable maxim that an Englishman's home is his castle. I think I'd probably even extend the whole home/castle thing to the Scottish and Welsh, and women too. Gay marriage, schools teaching about homosexuality, the right for absolute lunatics to have stupid protests about religion. I'm all for it.
Obviously being a free country isn't all about gays and religious lunatics. I should probably emphasise that I am making no comparisons between the two. Gays are normal people, religious lunatics are, well, lunatics. But you know, believe in and live in whatever manner you please as long as it doesn't harm other people. So yes, if you want, carry banners around the place proclaiming 'death to all who insult Islam' because that doesn't actually harm people. It just makes you look like a complete simpleton, denouncing freedom of speech using the medium of freedom of speech. It's then the not very taxing job of sensible people to make arguments against the 'kill people for making fun of something' brigade to ensure their continuing unpopularity.
Unfortunately the phrase "it's a free country" is rarely used in a context that comes close to denoting any of the above. It is more readily put to use by people defending what they see as their inalienable right to be an arsehole. So the person playing their music out loud on the bus, the man knocking into the back of your chair in the cafe, or the drunken neanderthal making advances on you girlfriend at the bar, are all likely to use this pathetic defence when asked to stop. Look, my mentally challenged friends, I am now going to instruct you as to why your utterance of this phrase is so monumentally stupid. As a result of us 'living in a free country' I realise that what you are doing is not illegal. On balance it's probably a good thing we don't have laws against prodding the back of someone's chair, intentionally or otherwise. That is precisely why I politely asked you to stop, instead of calling the police.
So bravo idiot, we can agree on this point: no laws have been broken. But let me also remind you that there are no laws against crapping your pants or taking a bath in your own urine. Just because you're allowed to do something doesn't always mean you should. You see we live in this thing called a society, which, these days, tends to involve many people living in rather close proximity to each other. The way we have learnt not to live in a world whereby everyone does as they please - culminating in some kind of terrifying uncivilised, murderous, phone-music-on-bus free for all - is through the acceptance of some common guidelines known as manners. The very 'free country' mantra you so proudly recite like some kind of uncritical four year old, is based on the premise that all humans are able to display a level of empathy towards others and should therefore be granted a level of freedom to do as they please and a right to vote about issues that will affect society. By being an unflinching prick, not only is your 'free country' defence completely out of context, but your actions are undermining the very foundation that it is built on. Dick. FC
Obviously being a free country isn't all about gays and religious lunatics. I should probably emphasise that I am making no comparisons between the two. Gays are normal people, religious lunatics are, well, lunatics. But you know, believe in and live in whatever manner you please as long as it doesn't harm other people. So yes, if you want, carry banners around the place proclaiming 'death to all who insult Islam' because that doesn't actually harm people. It just makes you look like a complete simpleton, denouncing freedom of speech using the medium of freedom of speech. It's then the not very taxing job of sensible people to make arguments against the 'kill people for making fun of something' brigade to ensure their continuing unpopularity.
Unfortunately the phrase "it's a free country" is rarely used in a context that comes close to denoting any of the above. It is more readily put to use by people defending what they see as their inalienable right to be an arsehole. So the person playing their music out loud on the bus, the man knocking into the back of your chair in the cafe, or the drunken neanderthal making advances on you girlfriend at the bar, are all likely to use this pathetic defence when asked to stop. Look, my mentally challenged friends, I am now going to instruct you as to why your utterance of this phrase is so monumentally stupid. As a result of us 'living in a free country' I realise that what you are doing is not illegal. On balance it's probably a good thing we don't have laws against prodding the back of someone's chair, intentionally or otherwise. That is precisely why I politely asked you to stop, instead of calling the police.
So bravo idiot, we can agree on this point: no laws have been broken. But let me also remind you that there are no laws against crapping your pants or taking a bath in your own urine. Just because you're allowed to do something doesn't always mean you should. You see we live in this thing called a society, which, these days, tends to involve many people living in rather close proximity to each other. The way we have learnt not to live in a world whereby everyone does as they please - culminating in some kind of terrifying uncivilised, murderous, phone-music-on-bus free for all - is through the acceptance of some common guidelines known as manners. The very 'free country' mantra you so proudly recite like some kind of uncritical four year old, is based on the premise that all humans are able to display a level of empathy towards others and should therefore be granted a level of freedom to do as they please and a right to vote about issues that will affect society. By being an unflinching prick, not only is your 'free country' defence completely out of context, but your actions are undermining the very foundation that it is built on. Dick. FC
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- H O T R A N T
- We are Hot Rant. We are Fred, Tom and Ashley. We write about things we hate. We write about things we don’t really like. We laugh at those unfortunates who lose the plot themselves. When we have nothing else to say, we post links of things we find funny or suitably furious. You can too. Please submit 500 word (max) contributions to hotrant@gmail.com for consideration. You can follow us on http://www.twitter.com/hotrant
