Our Father, Who Art on Holiday

Oh dear, it appears that the lord has washed his hands of us. At least, that's the impression being given by Dr Rowan Williams in his capacity as Doom-merchant of Canterbury. Speaking at York Minster he has declared that God "will not give a happy ending". Personally I didn't even know he gave massages, but then I haven't been to church in years. It could be virgin sweat and deep-fried camembert at communion for all I know.

"God's faithfulness stands, assuring us that even in the most appalling disaster love will not let us go - but it will not be a safety net". Splendid, so we will be going it alone with the earthquakes, floods and imminent return of 'Britain's Got Talent' but at least we'll get a sympathy card. A card which will remain on humanity's doormat as Williams also gave the good news that it will be "choked, drowned, or starved by its own stupidity." So the there the card will remain, our address carved into the paper with lightning, as our bloated forms lie stinking up our apartment, ingnored by all as the milk bottles pile up outside.

Notice how he doesn't include himself as part of the human race's dullards? "Look at you, you fat rhino-skinned sacks of crap. Look at you not praying. Well you're all fucked. I'm not, but you are. Well and truly."

"But Rowan, we pray too?"

"No you don't. If you did (which you don't) then you don't do it as hard as me. Which is irrelevant anyway, because you don't."

Miserable sod. It's not surprising he's so misanthropic, what else would you expect from the lovechild of Harold Shipman and Charles Manson? I blame the parents.

(I'm not really suggesting that the Archbishop of Canterbury is related to two of the most famous beardy killers of all time. In fact the very idea that he would have any involvement with an ideology that is responsible for large amounts of death, both historical and contemporary, is quite simply nonsense).

Worth Two in the Bush

Oh dear, Lance Armstrong has toppled over and broken his collarbone. It's been overdue for a while now as he always looks a little lop-sided. I'm surprised he doesn't spend his days cycling in circles.

Group Mourning

A Facebook-friend of mine has invited me to join the group 'R.I.P. Jade Goody'. I don't know why, I can only assume that he read between the lines of my hobbies and interests and found 'likes obituaries' there in a suitably depressed font. I appreciate the thought behind the group as Jade did raise a lot of awareness to 'The Big C' (cancer, not her husband) and as such many people feel touched by her (not in a creepy way of course, although now she's dead this may change) and feel the need to have somewhere they can post messages in which their tears operate the keyboard creating threads that consist entirely of attempts to out-gloom fellow mourners.

Facebook's good like that. If someone dies in a car crash people would have tied flowers to a railing, but now they can tearfully tap a message of woe to a community of people that have nothing in common other than the ability to be sad. Misery appetite sated, they can then get on with the important business of poking old school-chums and commenting on photos they've been tagged in ("omg I look well mingin', lol"). In Jade's case, once upon a time we might have sent flowers or donated to a charity to ensure that we felt involved in the family's grief. Now we can write on the virtual wall of a group that will be forgotten as soon as the next issue of 'Heat' hits the shelves and we are distracted by Jodie Marsh's plans to auction guided tours of her cervix in tribute. Bids start at a penny and she supplies the wellies.

Hooray for progress.

Tapping into Eternity

Things look bleak for light entertainment. Bruce Forsyth has collected a lifetime achievement award from the Royal Television Society and dropped a rather unpleasant bombshell.

He doesn't plan to retire.

I imagine that when he made the announcement it was greeted by roars of silence followed by one solitary handclap, and that would have been from Wee Jimmy Tarbuck pissed on free lucozade and glad not to be the most irrelevant dinosaur in the room. His agent's face will have sagged lower than Ulrika Jonsson's nipples since he was counting on Forsyth, having received a lifetime achievement award, taking the bloody hint and ending his reign on prime-time tat. "People have been asking me for ten or fifteen years if I'll retire, it's getting to be an old question- I'm nearly as old as the question!" chuckled Bruce to an ocean of despondance. No Bruce, you can sleaze over Tess Daly as much as you like, noone is going to look at your stuttering fizog and see a sprightly fifteen year old gearing up for his GCSEs. Due in no small part to the cavernous wrinkles that line every feature, wrinkles so deep that tourists ought to be offered plane trips into them in order to fully appreciate the geography.

Bruce is 81. "But I still feel 30" he declares with gleeful insanity. This is bad news, because by my calculations that means there are 2.7 Bruce-years to a human's single year. Even if he retires at Bruce-age 65, that makes him over 175. That's 94 more years. We're not even half-way!

There's only two options open to us. Kill ourselves or leave. As the saying goes, will the last person to leave the country please turn out the light.

A Saw Evacuation

In the spirit of Harry Hill, I state the following: I like roller coasters. I like horror films. But which is better? There's only one way to find out...riiiiiiiide!! So anyway, you get the idea with that.

Friday the 13th March saw the grand opening of splatter-themed bruise-inducer 'Saw: The Ride' at Thorpe Park, and by happy coincidence a couple of days later found me confusedly jamming my bar-coded ticket into the entry gate of the aforementioned Palace O'Sick, so I have now 'faced my fear' (or whatever the Billy the tricycle riding clown told me to do). Yay me. I have to say, I didn't realise I had a fear of bored park employees, hammily shouting at people to "do what he says...or else", that needed facing. Nice to have faced it though.

The ride itself is a fairly generic (thus, brilliant) shit-yourself-at-the-top-catch-it-on-the-way-down hair-messer, albeit with rotating blades and the occasional "you think it's over, it's only just begun" courtesy of the grumpy-bones 'Jigsaw Killer' to remind you that the vertical clack-clack-clack climb is unlikely to feature a massage parlour with a complimentary happy-ending for the day's designated driver.

Highly recommended though. If you find yourself there at any time soon I urge you to give it a go. Also, if you happen to see a stray rectum whilst queuing please return it to me. I took the precaution of stitching an address label to the side.



(here's a ride video I found on youtube)

Get Your Funny Out

Oh look, Comic Relief is upon us once again, exploding onto our screens in a shower of hilarious wigs and dancing newsreaders. We can look forward to spending ten rib-tickling hours watching Lenny Henry try to remember how television works whilst Fearne Cotton interviews a baked bean wallowing fireman in a Leeds car park and Bono asks us to donate to the U2 fund by performing their latest over-rated wailfest faster than you can say ‘tax-dodger’. Fortunately the good ship Gervais has appeared on the horizon and will be docking in time to prevent the constant starving African interruptions from dragging down the mood too much. So that’s good.

The nationwide rag-week leading up to Red Nose Day never really changes. I saw a man selling the Big Issue in town wearing a red wig and nose. Nice to know that the money from his sales is being spent wisely isn’t it. Not that I buy it of course (the crossword’s shit: ‘to live in a house illegally, 5 letters, S-Q-something-something-something’) but I find it quite difficult to do feel sorry charitable for someone wearing a novelty nose formed into a smile resembling Sian Lloyd’s. They just don’t scream ‘hard times’. In fact, maybe if they did scream at passers by it would help. One inch from their faces so that flecks of corrosive homeless spittle settled on their foreheads as they pretend to be fascinated by their shoes.

Even members of the animal community are being silly for charity. A short legged pony has been larking about fooling people into thinking that he’s sinking into a swamp. It’s a lovely idea, people seeing this ‘sausage pony’ standing in a field, waving its hooves and crying, only to bugger off chuckling to itself once the rescue party appears.

I’m actually a little bit jealous, because if you’re a pony out on the town, seductively neying “they call me… the sausage” must make enticing people to your boudoir that little bit easier.

Of course thinking about it, they are horses.

(BBC: 'Sausage Pony Prompts 999 Calls')

Spend a little, live not-a-lot

Have you seen the current Aldi advert? Chubby-chasing Phil Vickery shouts incredulously at us as he's so amazed by how cheap the food is.

"I don't know how they do it!!"

Shit ingredients Phil, that's how.