Why We're Here

I wish people really would see the bigger picture. If only you could see it from my enlightened viewpoint - the whole sum of human knowledge, the journey from worshipping an omnipotent skygod to understanding the fundamental forces that drive existence, the sudden flashes of inspiration that turned accepted wisdom on its head and broadened the horizons of humanity, the realisation that we are a small insignificant infestation on an unremarkable rock, all of these billions of slow painful years of evolution and development have one goal:

TO ENSURE THAT BOB DIAMOND CAN AFFORD A REALLY BIG MASSIVE FOOKING YACHT.

Anyone ever get the feeling that we're really wasting our energy as a species in a massively stupid way?

Everton FC - the Season So Far

Well, we've laughed, we've cried, we've wondered about the strange ineffability of the fundamental truth that we are doomed to be eternally unsuccessful.

That is Everton's season so far.

I've had a strange relationship with Everton in my life. Vivid memories include the 2-0 victory over QPR in the title-winning 1984-85 season when I was more concerned with why so many people were pissing at the front of the terraces. Or the season when my Uncle Tony bought us all a season ticket for 1986-87, forcing us to attend every match and resulting in me getting rapidly bored with football and reading the Your Sinclair magazine from cover to cover rather than watching the action unfold in front of me. Or the summer when my younger brother Daniel watched me and older brother John pre-pubescently sing Everton's 1984 FA Cup song for hours on end.

Anyway, all those are happy memories. Ish.

But this season has been the ultimate anti-climax. After a period of what seemed like incremental progress, and the formation of a strong team, Everton now play decent football, create chances, and then miss those chances with the accuracy of a 1990 Iraqi Scud missile.

If we had a purse, the purse strings would be tightened. However, with Bill 'What's my motivation darling?' Kenwright at the helm, it seems to be a struggle to keep the lights on at Goodison, never mind compete with other clubs of a similar standing to purchase players who will improve the squad.

We've performed admirably against the Big Guns, winning at Eastlands, drawing at Anfield and Stamford Bridge, juxtaposed against severe arse rammings at the hands of West Brom and others.

In short, I haven't got a fucking clue what's going to happen next. All I do know is that Everton FC are in my heart, they're in my soul, they're the cause of my stomach ulcers, and greying hair. I love them, I hate them, I wish they'd fuck off, I want to hug them, and then I want to dismember them.

Anyway, all of this angst will be passed on to my 2 year old and 5 month old sons. Poor blighters.

Seriously, what the fuck

The murder of a young woman. Not having change for a toll booth.

In the mind of Liz Jones, journalist extraordinaire for the Daily Mail, these two things seem equally as significant.

A few weeks ago, the body of a young woman named Jo Yeates was found just outside Bristol. CCTV evidence pieced together her last movements through Bristol, and her final purchases. A journalist for the Daily Mail took it upon herself to trace Jo's ultimate journey and provide insight, emotion and poignancy in the form of a newspaper column.

In fact, what she did, was commit the single most egregiously awful, unintentionally funny opinion piece in 21st century media.

I'll let you judge for yourselves:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1347621/Joanna-Yeates-murder-Becoming-just-thumbnail-police-website.html

As a counterpoint, I'd advise you to read this excellent homage to Ms Jones at the Daily Mash:

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/opinion/columnists/is-lovely-liz-becoming-just-another-thumbnail-on-the-daily-mail-website?-201101173437/

Just to extract a minuscule sentence from the original (serious) article:

"I almost buy that upmarket pizza; the choice tells me Jo wanted a lovely life, something above the ordinary."

I know someone's died here, but for fuck's sake, extrapolating pizza preference into life aspirations is a fairly bold leap. Personally, I buy 'Cravendale PurFiltr Milk'. Does that mean I yearn for the day mankind can set aside its petty differences and have a big old game of Trivial Pursuit together? Does it fuck.

Further on in the article, our protagonist Liz describes her horror at being unable to cross the Clifton Suspension Bridge due to lacking funds. As a regular traveller through the Wallasey tunnel (£1.40 since you ask), and having experienced the beeping vitriol that gushes forth once people realise you haven't got the means to cross the toll booth, I can honestly say that the murder of a young landscape architect and temporarily inconveniencing a number of drivers through neglecting to carry enough cash to pass by a toll road are TWO COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FUCKING THINGS.

Christ on a bike.

Hole in the Wall

For anyone who hasn't seen the BBC's epoch making light entertainment orgasmathon, 'Hole in the Wall', the basic premise is that celebrities have to contort their pampered limbs into certain shapes to comply with a polystyrene wall that slowly moves towards them. Should their bodies not be in the right shape, they are unceremoniously dumped (dumped!!!) into a small pool of water, while the audience laugh like lobotomised hyenas and Strictly Come Dancing's Anton du Beke demonstrates as much charisma as a water butt.

I was watching this, and while an irreparable hole in my soul quietly formed, I was thinking of ideas to make it a genuinely watchable experience, and not a 30 minute period of existential angst. I suppose I could have got off my fat arse, reached for the remote and turned over, but I'd just had a large meal and couldn't move.

Anyway, here are the ideas I came up with to increase the level of viewing pleasure associated with Hole in the Wall:

1. Swap the polystyrene for a reinforced concrete wall.
2. Fill the pool with concentrated hydrofluoric acid.
3. Increase the speed of the moving wall from roughly 4mph (walking pace) to 140mph.
4. The shapes that the celebrity must form to remain intact can only be performed by an eighteen-limbed silicon based life form with fourteen penises.
5. Replace Anton du Beke with the 45-year old corpse of Buster Keaton.

All other suggestions welcome.