Clare Short marries Jordan and Alex Reid in Haiti*

* = have you heard of SEO? It's all about cramming relevant facts into the headline. We're taking it to a slightly new (ridiculous) level...

It pains me, it really does. I wake up in the morning and I think to myself, "I really should write something on that blog..."
And then I roll over and think about it and drift off to sleep.

Well, not really.

I spent so much time building this little thing up, writing it and caring for it. It's a bit like watching a plant in the garden wilt and slowly die.

There is something that I am working on and enjoying it, even though at the moment it's in need of updating...

http://yearofcox.tumblr.com
And no, it's not pictures of willies.

I have taken a really cool picture which I can't wait to upload. If only I could find the lead that attaches the camera to the laptop. Bollocks...

Oh, I'm sorry but where did 2009 go?

And - can you believe that it's already nearly February?

Can we talk about music for just one second. In particular, one song...

When I hear the first few notes of the tune my back teeth start to ache, like when you bite into ice cream.

I'm going to type the first few words for you and perhaps you will scream and run to the dance floor in some sort of twee mock excitement.

Or you could do what I do and battle to keep your dinner down. You ready?

"I gotta feeling. That tonight's gonna be a good night..." Oh god.

You know how the rest goes... "Too nize the night. Let's live it uh" etc.

I've tried to pin down exactly what it is that makes me loathe the song so intensly and I think the reason is that it's too contrived.

There are other songs like it;
Chumbawumba - Tubthumping
Lou Bega - Mambo No. 5
Baha Men - Who Let The Dogs Out

Those are songs that, at the time, everyone thought were fabulously hip but were actually just destined to become a disco filler at weddings when the drunk dads in suits stagger about the dance floor.

"I Gotta Feeling" is just as bad as the rest of them. It's safe. Contrived. Phony. It's a bumper sticker of a song. It's like the "joke" that the presenter's sidekick tells in the morning on the radio.
It's the FW: FW: email that contains some lame quote about ambition and destiny.

I don't think I'm being sufficiently rude enough. Although, why have I decided to attack it now?

Murphy's Law dictates that as soon as you cultivate an intense dislike for a piece of music, you will then hear it as often as possible - gym, radio, shopping centre...

I think it's quite enough for one day.

Brad Pit and Angelina Jolie divorce in shock Manchester United shirts*

* = obvious rubbish but for the sakes of SEO (aka making your site credible in the eyes of Google) we have to insert important words into the title.

Yes, I know. So.

The problem is that the internet in South Africa is reliably shit so you can't really do much. I was on holiday there, it was nice.

But now I am back in the UK, which is nice. Sort of.

Being back in Britain means using the internet is a far easier experience which is why I've been able to stick some of my favourite holiday pics on Flickr.

If you want to have a flick through them you can do... some of them I quite like and the only reason I do is because Cape Town is photo-tastic.

If you want to see some of the photos, click on the lonely rich man in his swimming pool in Clifton...


Although that's not what I wanted to show you.

Right. So we all know that this place has become a little dusty of late and that's because I have been working on something else.

No, not another ... basically, I tried it last year and gave up sometime in May mainly because I dropped my one and only camera.

It couldn't really work if you didn't have a camera. Now though, I have back-ups.

So basically... new toy but the toy you're looking at isn't going to be thrown into the bin. It's not dead, nothing's stopped and and...

Click to take you there, baby...



If you like it, you can check back but there are some points...

1/ I will take a new photo every day but sometimes I am not going to be near the internet in order to post it. I will do my best. Innit.
2/ Um...
3/ It's already annoying me because some of the colours in the photos look odd. And there's no uniform colour, structure or feel to the pictures. They're all a bit haphazard but maybe that's the point?!
I dunno - maybe they would be boring if they had some sort of uniform style.

Hopefully as the year progresses the photos will get better and better. Whatever.

Um... yeah.

Anyone for tennis?

British Airways staff vote to wear Gordon Brown masks and dance in the UK snow*

* = emphatically not true, but...

There's this new thing called SEO - have you heard of it? Apparently Google rates a lot of information about a site or story by the words in the title.
Hence, in 2010 we're going to have ridiculous titles because we're all about credibility and since British Airways, Gordon Brown and snow are all in the news, who are we not to jump on the bandwagon and piss from the inside outwards?
Oh, and SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation.

So, what a busy little beaver have you been then?

I have been busy too... preparing something for you. I'll show you in a couple of days but here's a taster...

I call it; "How to relax..."

Monday, 28 December 2009

22:19
When I listen to The Pointer Sisters singing "Neutron Dance" I have this urge to flap my arms.

Anyway...

So listen - God, does it feel like the end of the year to you? Everything's coming to an end. It's the end of a decade for God's sake.

I have started to collect some of my favourite images over the last few months and what kind of fool would I be, were I not to share them with you...

So this is the first one of the BT Tower in Central London.

I think the kind of space-shippy structure against the clear blue sky.

And then there's this image of 1970s Soviet Russia...

Well actually not. It's West London at dusk.

Don't you think the cold-looking air and reddish hue give it a feeling of suppressed communist living? I think so - it's the tower blocks...

Then this picture which I absolutely fucking love. Everything just seemed to come together at exactly the right time, although it makes me look fat...

The colours are like beige and black and, I think it's a little cool...

23:23
God. So that's it for 2009 in London.

Tomorrow I fly to Cape Town for New Year but more importantly, for a holiday.

Therefore, this is the last post from London for this decade.

Whenever I hear people talk of the end of the decade, I immediately want to start singing "reached the end of a decade... in another ten years' time... Who can say - what we'll find...what life's waiting down the line... In the end of - '89....."

Weird. Weird how I remember first listening to that song as a kid and thinking about the end of 1989, which hadn't yet come. That was about 20 years ago.

That's the problem with pop culture being bombarded at you constantly.

I bet you can't recite three lines of a classic poem but could recite and source these lines...

"Life is a mystery, everyone must stand alone. I hear you call my name and it feels like home."

"He came into your apartment, he left bloodstains on the carpet. Then you ran into the bedroom, you were struck down. It was your doom."

"As I look back upon my life, it's always with a sense of shame. I've always been the one to blame..."

"Some of them want to use you, some of them want to get used by you..."

"Hello. Is there anybody in there? Just nod if you can here me..."

And even then there are too many words...

"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?"
"Love... soft as an easy chair..."
"And now, the end is near..."

Or what about just three words.

"Lights! Models! Guestlist!"

23:54
So all of this leads to: Bobby's No. 1 song for 2009.

There have been some very strong contenders for this year...

Lady GaGa - Bad Romance
Mari1yn Man5on - Arma-goddam-mother-fucken-gedden (Teddy Bears remix)
Muse - United States of Eurasia
Pet Shop Boys - Love Etc.
Die Antwoord - Doosdronk
Fake Blood - Fix Your Accent
Prodigy - Invaders Must Die (Chase & Status remix)

However, the song that will come to forever be associated with 2009 stands head and shoulders above everything else.

I first heard it around March 2009 and instantly fell in love with it.

I knew I was going to have my birthday in Cape Town in early June and so I begged a DJ friend of mine, who spins at Cape Town's most fabulous gay club, if he would play the record for me when I was there.
I turned London upside down looking for a good quality bootleg copy and, as far as I can tell, the tune made its Cape Town debut thanks to me.

Back in London for the start of summer we went to the song's album launch in Heaven.

We danced to it at London pride. We danced to it at Brighton Pride. We roared with delight when Dizzy Rascal sampled bits of it at Wireless.

We beamed from ear to ear when they played it at XXL. And one of the remixes they played at Beyond.

When I was back in Cape Town in September I went back to the homo club and Charl played a remix version of the song when he saw me. (The Alex Sax and Evan Sax mix)

It is a song that, when I listen back to it in 20 years' time, will remind me of everything that's happened in 2009.

I've tried to hold myself together
Tried to forget you, gone away...
The tears I've cried
They won't subside.
Unless the music starts to play...
So come along now boys; and sing it loud and sing it proud...

Heartbreak Make Me A Dancer...
DJ give me the answer
Love stop getting me down, down, down...!

What an absolutely worthy winner of the title of The Song of 2009...


(Oh yeah, and if you're doing isotonic training and working your biceps and want to hold something for a minute, the time from the bridge to the end of the build-up after the second chorus is exaclty one minute...)

23:58
So will you excuse me while I go and finish the rest of my packing. See you in Cape Town.

2010 reckons, boys...

Wednesday, 23 December 2009

There are a few oddities in our house...

(How much would it bother you, were this to become some sort of weird photoblog? That's what it appears to be turning into...)

So anyway, in our house there some rooms where all reality seems to have been excluded. For example...

In the lounge there's a mirror that doesn't reflect.

And then in our kitchen, the microwave has a setting for "zero gravity".

If you're not expecting it, it can be a little disconcerting...

But enough of the house of comedy.

Have a look at these...

First is a VW that was parked in the road outside. I reckon, if you were to put a car into the deep freeze, this is how it would turn out after a few hours.

Yeah, it's been cold over the last few days.

And this is what -7C looks like...

How do you feel about that?

Cold should be your answer...!

Saturday, 19 December 2009

I am thinking of starting something called a blog. What you ever heard of something so ridiculous?

You're supposed to post stuff everyday. Don't make me laugh.

The name of this blog would be called "Teabreak On The Thunderbirds Set." That's because, when everyone takes tea on The Thunderbirds set, all the marionettes go limp and collapse...










I can't believe that people indulge in these silly blog things. They're for sissies...

Wednesday, 16 December 2009

22:51
I went and bought a new camera yesterday which I am loving. Although Sally isn't.

She says it's like living with the fucking paparazzi because there are even flashes coming from the bathroom. Ahem.

So anyway, to practice with this new device, I though I would share some pictures with you. This could be filed under the tab "most boring post in the world ever" but thank you for indulging me. Innit.

What I am going to show you, in a series of photographs is how to make my lunch.

First you're going to need square medium-sized Tupperware boxes.

Then, get a cucumber and chop it into little slices using a knife. Obviously.

You'll also need three tins of tuna. I used what must be the best invention ever and that is drained tuna. It means you simply peal open the tin and it's ready to eat.

No silly tin openers, no draining the bloody stuff...

Use a fork and dig the tuna out of tin but not too hard, otherwise you risk flicking the tuna halfway across the kitchen.

And now sort of poke your fork around the tuna and cucumber pretending to be all cookery-like...

Next, open a bag of Sainsbury's ready-prepared salad - the one with beetroot in it. I think it's around £1,19 a bag.

Then, as a little treat, drain some smoked mussels. Totally fucking healthy food fuck-fest...

Finally, once you've added the whole lot together, it looks quite yummy.

And store in the fridge for you to take to work and eat the next day.

And that's the story of my lunch for tomorrow.

Thank you for reading. Seriously. Thank you.

(Er... is anyone still awake or have you fallen asleep on your hands...?)

Those nine pictures in a few words each:
1/ Badly framed
2/ Wrong bits of the cucumber are in focus
3/ Okayish
4/ Tuna's too pink
5/ Dull
6/ Odd light from above
7/ Looks like everything's about slide off to the right of the picture
8/ Flat
9/ Stock (dull)