Glob-a-log

I’ve said it many times before but I love scientists - I do, even though they are now creating a race of super cats that will probably wipe mankind off the face of the earth by giving all of us heart attacks but sometimes these white coats truly can’t leave well enough alone.

I mean, Jesus H. Tom-Cruising Christ, is nothing sacred anymore…?!

The Vikings are traditionally known for leaving destruction in their wake as they travelled around Europe raping, pillaging and plundering. But Cambridge University has launched a campaign to recast them as “new men” with an interest in grooming, fashion and poetry.

Academics claim that the old stereotype is damaging, and want teenagers to be more appreciative of the Vikings’ social and cultural impact on Britain. They say that the Norse explorers, far from being obsessed with fighting and drinking, were a largely-peaceful race who were even criticised for being too hygienic.

What’s next? Attila the Hun being a miniature golf fiend, Vlad the Impaler a needle-point fanatic, King Herod a bigger fan of pajama parties than Michael Jackson?

Academics presenting Vikings as ‘new men’ – no doubt as part of some fucking political correctness campaign – is simply too much.

So, time for a fight back. If the forces of sycophantic sound-bites can’t leave our villains, monsters & bogeymen in peace, we will have to meet the enemy head-on and start our own history grab campaign.

We will tell the world that Florence Nightingale spied for the Turks and that Joan of Arc fucked all comers. That Saint Francis from Assisi started the first bird flue epidemic and that Geogre Washington used to burn small animals to death under that fucking cherry tree.

That will teach them to leave those poor Vikings alone. ‘Grooming, fashion and poetry…’

Give me strength!

(From christiannymphos.org)

Sex sells. We know that. Hell, even the Church of England knows that:

Married people have more and better sex, according to a Church of England website designed to encourage couples to tie the knot. The site also quotes The Case for Marriage, by Linda Waite and Maggie Gallagher, which says marriage “typically brings spectacular sexual rewards”.

It’s kind of funny though – and if you’re serious about religion, also more than a bit sad.

I mean, it’s one thing to use sex to sell soap, cars, jeans, reality TV shows and other mass consumption fodder but to sell the love of God through sex ads is more than a bit desperate. Actually, even to an agnost of long standing as I am, it sounds positively blasphemous – and it comes with more than a whiff of sulphur.

You can see some dubious focus group, hidden away in the attic of Canterbury cathedral. “How can we make the church relevant again?” one asks; “How do we sell the message?” Then, like Saul on the way to Damascus, they see the light. They start to dance and clap their hands and sing, “Let’s talk about sex!”

Of course, you can also, and even more easily, picture Jesus on that mountain, talking to Satan. Satan offers the Son of Man ultimate and sole power in the world. “Just do this one little thing for Me,” Satan proposes “And this world is Yours. Just kneel before Me, pay tribute to Me, and all of it is Yours.”

We know what Jesus did – and we also now know what the Church of England chose to do, even without this explicit guarantee of power. No, the C. of E. is quite happy to sell its soul to the force that drives Endemol Productions, just for a whiff of ‘relevance.’

Sad.

Mind you, it wouldn’t surprise me if the ultimate October surprise in the American presidential election would be a leaked sex tape of Palin and McCain. ‘Cause the Republican Party is now becoming even more desperate to prove (or at least sell) its relevance than the C. of E. - and even less principled.

You know how everybody always laughs at the French, for trying to fight the Americanisation of their culture? It’s a losing battle, obviously. People from all around the world simply like American movies, American fastfood, American music, T-shirts with American slogans etcetera.

Nothing you can do about it, however deplorable some people might find it. You can’t even call it a form of colonialism anymore. That implies force – the kind of old-fashioned persuasion that came with gun ships and powerful bureaucratic organizations.

You could still call this Americanisation a kind of infectious disease, if you like dramatic metaphors but even then you could hardly call it an infliction, since it is totally interactive. There are no true patients here, only eager participants. So, it’s more a symbiotic relationship than a parasitic one.

Having said that, I do have some sympathy for the profoundly elitist French position. This from today’s English Guardian:

At the third stroke, the voice of the speaking clock is going to sound like someone who is away with the fairies. Tinker Bell, once Peter Pan’s famously speechless accomplice from Never Never Land, will be marking time for millions of people over the next three months. From the moment summer time ends early on Sunday morning, the sound of a 72-year-old British institution will change dramatically. The rushed high-pitched tones of Mae Whitman, the young American actor who provides the less-than-ethereal voice for a cartoon version of the fairy, will announce: “Hi! It’s Tinker Bell. At the third bell, the time will be …”

BT is marking the end of British summer time in a sponsorship deal with Disney, which is releasing a DVD and Blu-Ray film named after JM Barrie’s creation next month. In the film she will be seen flying past Big Ben, which in real life is set by the speaking clock. The makers of Tinker Bell - an animated film set before the Peter Pan story - deny this is a transatlantic intrusion. Brad Raymond, the director of the film, said: “Tinker Bell’s voice has warmth, clarity and friendliness so we’re delighted that she is being given this magical opportunity to be heard by millions. She is a natural choice for such an important job, given her very British heritage.”

British heritage, my arse. Just more highly annoying Disney creep – and just what you bloody need when you’re too groggy to tell the time yourself: Some happy, hopped-up American teen idol voice telling you it’s truly time to get up and fucking kill yourself.

Well, as I said, I’m with the French here, so I would say, with them, to Tinkerbell and to the whole and wholly disgusting Disney company, “Merci and fuck you very much.”

Or, as a certain king once said to his men, “Can no-one rid me of that bothersome bug?!”

A few weeks ago, I came upon an article, called ‘Viagra: 10 things you need to know.’ Now, I don’t like to be told what I need to know – but I’m also incurably curious, so I did read the damn thing. It was a pretty uninspiring list, to be honest, although the seventh item on it was of some interest:

“The most common side-effects associated with Viagra are headache, flushing, dizziness, palpitations, indigestion and blurred or blue- tinged vision.”

Which did nothing to change my views about the desirability of the product. Not so much the flushing, dizziness, palpitations and/or indigestion part. A weekend of fairly heavy drinking or listening to John McCain talking about his ‘Good-Friend-Joe-The-Plumber’ has more or less the same effect.

No, it was that ‘blue-tinged vision’ bit that had me worried. I mean, there you are, in bed, with a throbbing hard-on and a naked woman, who now, before your eyes, turns into a fucking smurf…

Not good.

Anyway, as I said, nothing on that list convinced me that I really needed to try the stuff out. In fact, it just put me in the mood for making a list of my own. Call it, ‘Ten good reasons to embrace impotence‘:

1) Heather Mills

2) Marge Simpson

3) Sharon Stone

4) Paris Hilton

5) Miss Piggy

6) Lorena Bobbit

7) Tammy Winette

8) The Borg queen

9) Sarah Palin

10) Mallory Knox

You know the expression, ‘When America sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold.’

Which is, of course, exactly what happened to Iceland. You might think that the country’s gals & geysers were used to a bit of extreme weather but the credit crunch had these sturdy Icelandic folks contemplating their shattered economy with chattering teeth:

REYKJAVIK, Iceland (Reuters) — Iceland drew on Nordic help to obtain foreign currency on Tuesday and held talks with Russia about a possible loan to stave off a crisis that has left its economy near collapse.”

Of course, any port in a serious shit storm.

When in crisis, people tend to run to the hills, hide in churches and/or start wars – so, for Iceland to go, cap in hand, to Norway & Russia is a quite sensible and restraint, if rather boring behaviour.

Happily, not all Icelanders have chosen to go for the sane option.

Back in America, where this latest round of world wide whoopee coughing started, these desperate times have led to the founding of a new church: ‘The Church of Joe the Plumber of Latter-day Saints.’

Which almost makes sense: When the economy springs a leak, call in a plumber…

In Iceland, one man has decided to copy this single-, if simple-minded tactic, arguing that a serious cold needs a serious handkerchief:

An Icelandic designer has created the world’s first bullet-proof handkerchief – aimed at well-dressed gentlemen with dangerous lifestyles. The life-saving accessory sits in the breast pocket in order to “protect the heart of men” and is made from Kevlar. The material, which is used to make protective vests and Formula 1 cars, can withstand a bullet as well as temperatures of up to around 400 degrees centigrade.

To be honest, I think that American Republican prayers to Joe the Plumber will prove to be about as effective as this bulletproof hanky.

Chances for both of these hopes and strategies surviving for much longer than a day’s worth of breaking news bulletins, could be described as ‘a snot ball in Hell’.

(Mr Hanky: Now also bulletproof)

It’s a sad story but it could also serve as a riddle – like, “Do you know the difference between George Bush and an aboriginal?”:

Australian officials are reporting an increase in petrol-sniffing in Aboriginal communities controversially taken over by the government. The government is managing dozens of troubled Northern Territory settlements in a move to curb child abuse and alcoholism. But tribal leaders believe attempts to curb alcohol abuse could have fed a sharp rise in petrol sniffing. The chemical fumes provide a cheap high and respite from crushing poverty.

As I said, a sad story but then there are few happy tales that grow from under the long shadows cast by conquest, slavery and mass murder.

Anyway, so, the answer to the riddle would be, “Both are addicted to petrol but only one of them wages billion dollar wars to feed his habit.”

(No more chocolate dick dip?)

In these turbulent economic times, people look for reinsurance – and expressions like, “You can take that to the bank” won’t really do that anymore.

It’s time, in other words, to put our trust in more time-honoured institutions, and phrases. In a credit crunch, you need the comfort only old sayings like “Safe as mother’s milk” can provide.

Of course, there are more than economic reasons why you’d want to stick with mother’s milk, as the following story shows:

Ann Summers, the sex shop chain, has pulled thousands of novelty chocolate products from its shelves and website after tests revealed they were contaminated with the industrial chemical melamine. Food safety experts detected levels of melamine were up to 100 times greater than limits set by the European commission

The Food Standards Agency issued an alert over chocolate willy spread, a related nipple spread and a novelty pen set, which contains a chocolate-flavoured body pen, all of which were imported from a Chinese manufacturer called Le Bang.

The FSA said the withdrawal was precautionary and the risk was low. “This is a first. We’ve never had to put out an alert before on willy spread, chocolate-flavoured or otherwise,” it added.

Quite.

(The cutting edge chocolate nipple nibble set)

By the way, if you, like me, wondered what the fuck a ‘novelty pen set’ was doing in a sex shop, here’s the (slightly disappointing) answer:

The Chocolate and Strawberry “Lovers” Body Pen Set is an erotic and sensual way to indulge your sweet tooth! Each pack contains one chocolate flavoured and one strawberry flavoured liquid which is good to eat and apply easily. Using the pens is a romantic way to create fun messages that are for your partners eyes only! Once read, you must destroy the evidence. Do this in the most delicious way possible by slowly and sensually licking it off!!

What fun.

Mind you, if you can’t trust bank nor mother milk substitutes, maybe we should forget about both the past and the present. Perhaps it’s time for one of those old-fashioned great leaps forwards. To boldly go where no-one’s buggered off to before.

I mean, we can already clone sheep, can’t we? Which is nice but what has that wooly Dolly ever done for you? So, let’s go for something slightly more useful than a bloody sheep, next time. Something more liberating than that silly ‘Free Willie’ movie ever offered.

Yes, no longer will the nation be asked to satisfy its hunger with a load of spotted dick. Not if we can have an endless supply of cloned dick - cloned chocolate dicks, of course:

(Baptized in Jordan…?)

The following bit of ‘breaking news’ is not exactly a new idea – but then, the church has never really liked new ideas. It’s only recently that the  Church of England did “apologise to Charles Darwin for its initial rejection of his theories, nearly 150 years after he published his most famous work.”

Of course, that came a few years after the last Pope, “John Paul II attempted to purify the soul of the Roman Catholic church by making a sweeping apology for 2,000 years of violence, persecution and blunders. From the altar of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome he led Catholicism into unchartered territory by seeking forgiveness for sins committed against Jews, heretics, women, Gypsies and native peoples.”

Anyway, so it takes the church some time to get used to new ideas and, as I said, the following idea has been floating around for quite a bit:

The Bible has become banal and rock songs are often more effective in expressing Christianity, a leading bishop has claimed. The Rt Rev Nick Baines, Bishop of Croydon, has urged churches to use hits by bands such as U2 and the Beatles in their services. In a book backed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, he argues that pop music writers can convey deep theological concepts in a way that is more accessible to the younger generation.

Now, I’m an agnost and Dutch to boot, so I don’t really care what they are getting up to in the Church of England but I still find ideas as the above profoundly depressing – if only because they always tend to lead to odious projects like ‘Jesus Christ Superstar.’

By the way, I have read the Bible and I do admit that It has Its moments of extreme tediousness. It is kind of repetitive too, in places, and not always all that coherent. However, to call It banal – especially in comparison to the majority of pop songs – goes a bit far, perhaps.

Me, I would rather take the Book of Job with me to that famous deserted island than the complete works of ABBA and I suspect that even Richard Dawkins would prefer to attend High Mass to going to a house party.

By the way, it is interesting to note that, in the eyes of the Church, U2 have joined the Beatles in being the kind of music the younger generation listens to. Which brings us right back to my starting point, to wit, that the Church can’t really take in anything new, until it has been around for at least a quarter of a century.

Which is not altogether bad, of course. Otherwise, the good Bishop would probably have suggested that Jane Goody or Jordan became the C of E’s new spokesperson.

Mind you, since every celeb, these days, wants to become a writer, it would be fun to ask  Jane and Katie if they would like to try to rewrite the Bible as a children’s book. Like ‘Jordan’s Old Testament for tots’ & ‘Goody’s Gospels for girls’ or something like that.

Anyway, why not give the Bishop of Croydon’s idea a try and play some Beatles in church – if we can start with the song that was truly made for him:

(1958 film noir, ‘Touch of evil’)

Did you know that the first Transatlantic jet flight took off – and landed safely - 50 years ago?

“Next Saturday marks the 50th anniversary of BOAC’s Comet 4 crossing of the Atlantic with passengers who paid at least £279 and 15 shillings for the breakthrough journey on a plane with powder rooms containing “Elizabeth Arden toilet requisites for ladies and Yardley for men”. This fare works out at £4,951 when inflation is taken into consideration - 16 times more than a recent British Airways seat sale of £299.”

Which made me wonder what else exactly happened 50 years ago.

So, I Googled ‘1958 news’ and the first site to appear, strangely enough, was www.fun4birthdays.com, which informed me that 1958 was the year that saw the birth of NASA (and the year that the Brazilians won the football – or soccer – World Cup.)

fun4birthdays.com also informs us that in this year “a revolution in Iraq overthrows the monarchy.” So, even 50 years ago, Iraq was not the easiest place to govern. Who’d have thought…?

The second site in the list, thepeoplehistory.blogspot.com, informs us, among other things, that, in 1958, Elvis Presley was inducted into the Army, US Nuclear Submarine ” Nautilus ” passed under the North Pole and the Wham-O company introduced the Hula Hoop.

It is certainly a comfort to know, that in the midst of the Cold War, the Hula Hoop became a sheer obsessive rage. It makes us and our trivial pursuits in the face of world terrorism, global warming and an economical melt-down seem slightly less insane – or, at least, no more insane than the people who lived through those troubling times.

I guess all of humanity, all throughout history, has had these moments when it seems of all-encompassing importance that the orchestra keeps playing on the deck of the Titanic ‘du jour’.

Onwards and upwards – or backwards, if you like. Skipping a few, fairly useless listed sites, we come upon www.imdb.com, which informs us that the movie ‘Touch of evil’ came out in 1958. A short trip to the Wiki pages later and we learn that:

“The movie opens with a famous three-minute, thirty second continuous tracking shot that film critics (such as Bob Dorien and Robert Osborne) generally consider to be one of the greatest long shots in cinematic history. Beginning on the Mexico/US border, this shot shows a man placing a bomb in a car and then the journey of the car past the border crossing into the United States.”

Damn.

Revolutions in Iraq, bombs being smuggled into the USA… Some things never seem to change, don’t they?

Ah well, as the writer Peter de Vries once remarked, “Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be.” So, enough – though I will leave you with a song from 1958, of course. There were many good (and weird) candidates to choose from. Like,

1) The Everly Brothers: “All I have to do is dream”
2)  Jerry Lee Lewis: “Great balls of fire” or
3) The McGuire Sisters and Perry Como: “Sugartime”

My favourite, however, is a clip of ‘The chipmunk song’, performed by Alvin and the Chipmunks, but shown in a slightly more modern setting.

A bit like that old Iraq revolution, seen or pulled through a neo-con prism, if you like. Enjoy:

Harry Potter Chipmunk Song - More bloopers are a click away

(Levi Stubbs)

So, today they buried Austria’s much beloved right wing party leader Jörg Haider – a kind of Hitler light, without the painting skills or the mad moustache – and his demented followers compared this passing with the death of princess Diana.

Which is kind of funny, come to think of it – and you can see at least one obvious parallel. Diana also died in a car crash, because the designated driver was both drunk and speeding. We now know Haider was also well over both the speed and the alcohol limits. We can only hope that, in the coming days, we will hear that he, like Diana, also had a male, Muslim lover with him in the car.

I’m sure that last bit of news would cheer up all of his fans no end.

Anyway, Haider’s dead and buried now, which is good news but not something to commemorate beyond a few heart-felt sniggers.

It’s certainly not worth mentioning in the same column as the death of a much loved, and much admired artist like Levi Stubbs, who also died today.

The reason I do so anyway is that, while all men may be shaped from the same clay and leave no more than a handful of dust, the way we live our lives can differ vastly.

Some lives, like Haider’s, become an abomination – and their death the coldest sort of relief.

Other lives, like that of the old Four Tops singer, become a celebration – and their death an occasion to reflect upon and mourn the loss but also to give thanks to all the many wonders that can be forged by and visited upon us.

So, let’s leave Haider now to the tender care of maggots, worms and all of nature’s other tiny garbage disposal units – and let’s end this column with three songs by Levi Stubbs (and The Four Tops:

1) Just ask the lonely

2) Reach out, I’ll be there

3) Baby, I need your loving

Okay, one more song. Billy Bragg’s wonderful tribute to Levi Stubbs: