It Starts with Little White Lies

This weekend, I have mostly been wondering how Julia Sawalha manages to keep her job. Perhaps you’re not familar with the advertising campaign for catalogue-based retailer Argos, in which she stars as hapless PA to Richard E. Grant’s ageing, but clearly very wealthy rock star. There’s been a whole series of ads, and usually the concept involves her covering up for some mistake or other by lying to her boss with the aid of shabby…

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And They All Lived Happily Ever After

Last night, after over three years of meaning to get round to it, I finally managed to see a performance at the Globe. At times, during Much Ado About Nothing, admittedly not one of my favourites, I was reminded that the comedies are–puts on English student hat, pretends to be in tutorial (wonders why no one is saying anything…)–er, like, a bit rubbish, aren’t they? You could argue that the same ridiculous plot devices occur…

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Shabby. Just Shabby.

Last night we happened to catch the first few minutes (it was all we could take) of the new BBC 3 show, and shameless Richard Herring rip-off, Hercules. Unfortunately, unlike Herring’s witty and charming take on the concept of performing 12 near-impossible feats, the BBC show is vapid sub-Survivor rubbish taking itself far too seriously (one of the contestants is an extreme Gym champion, which tells you just about all you need to know), and…

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Preparing for (Re-election) Panic

I must say, I’m eagerly awaiting our copy of the how to stop terrorism booklet, Protect and Survive, sorry, Protect and Survive 2004, which should be popping through the letterbox any day now. Apparently it contains some top advice (we’re supposed to duck and cover). Personally, I’m just very disappointed that we won’t be getting a stop terrorism fridge magnet, like when the Australians did this back in February (how do they expect us to…

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we confirm to Them that l’acquisto of the travel from demanded She e’ state concluded with happening

It’s just as well that I haven’t really got any work to do today, because it’s meant that I have been able to spend most of the working day making travel arrangements for our upcoming holiday in Croatia. At least now it’s a holiday in Croatia. Until this morning it was a holiday in Venice, that being the closest place we could get an even remotely reasonably priced flight to at short notice. Now I’ve…

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Making An Old Grumpy Man Slightly Less Grumpy

Last night, Sal, myself, and a couple of friends (some of whom for some reason choose not to describe the minutiae of their lives on the InterWebNet, but most of whom do) went along to see how Richard Herring would produce an hour’s worth of comedy entertainment out of the series of modern-day Herculean tasks he’s been attempting (and documenting on his own corner of the Internet, thus cementing his position as “king of the…

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Spotted…

On one of those Evening Standard headline boards by the train station yesterday: “CLIFF RICHARD TICKET RIP-OFF”. I didn’t have time to stop and find out, so does anyone out there know what the rip-off is, exactly? Perhaps the fact that they’re actually tickets to a Cliff Richard show?

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Metric Martyrs

Almost 8 months after moving into our flat (that’s 8 months into a 12 month lease), we’ve finally managed to persuade someone to charge us for our energy supplies. Unfortunately, in what is no doubt an affectionate tribute to the metric martyrs, the cheeky scamps at London Energy are clinging to the Imperial system and trying to charge us for our gas as if we had an old meter measuring usage in cubic feet, rather…

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“So you think I came to England and brought two guitars?”

So said Sydney’s Alex Lloyd, two songs into his set last night on breaking a string. “No, I only brought one, ’cause I couldn’t be arsed to carry two”. He recovered well, though, sending his roadie (a spectacularly underemployed chap, given that there was only Lloyd, his acoustic guitar and his keyboard player onstage, who had spent almost the entire half hour it had somehow taken to set things up taping up some leads with…

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