Posts from April 2007
30
Apr 07
AROOGAH! Asparagus!!
Hurrah! For, lo, it is asparagus season again, which coincided nicely with our weekend visit to Arbutus in Soho (srsly, go there, you can have two amazing courses and good wine for like £30 a head which is barely more than a curry in town these days, and certainly in no way excessive for Quality Food and, yeah, it’s popular but you can get a table at 6 no problems at all on less than a week’s notice).
Mrs Carsmile had a starter of steamed asparagus and fried DUCK EGG (it came in a frying pan) and I had asparagus soup with a big dollop of ricotta in the middle and we agreed that asparagus is almost the best vegetable ever.
Then tonight we had roast asparagus a la dast00r that we dipped (with a bit of faffing) into a WHOLE BAKED CAMEMBERT, what could possibly be nummier?
Also i got to revive one of my favourite ilx threads.
27
Apr 07
Tanya’s Army Of Awfulness: Carcass – CORPORAL JIGSORE QUANDARY
There are only two songs I could find that mentioned Corporals, and since my views on Pink Floyd seem adequately covered*, I would rather look at Carcass. Initially though I thought there would be little to say about the Napalm Death spin-off band which hasn’t been said here, or indeed is not said by the bands logo.
One wonders how someone gets into a band whose very logo is unintelligible. But then sense of lyrics comes low down in the priorities of a grindcore band: and way after “hair length”, “sounding like pigs dying in an abatoir” and of course “lifetime membership to the Tufty Club”.
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26
Apr 07
But Everyone Knows The Thing Is Circumsized
When old and new media colide. I think that someone in charge of the Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer (clearly problems occur when you call it Fantastic 4 2) Myspace page may need to rethink the tagline on this image.
Hmm, Animated Fantastic Foreskins.
But as noted above, this should not be an issue with two of the members at least. The Invisible Woman not having any in the first place (and even if she did it could turn invisible). And The Thing, erstwhile grumpy, super-strong rocky member of the FF, who is also one of the few Jewish superheroes. This rarely manifests itself, he seems completely happy to clobber on the Sabbath, but one assumes the Things, um Thing has already been skinned a long time ago. Before it was made of rock.
(For a longer list of the religions of various superheroes see here.)
25
Apr 07
Tanya’s Army Of Awfulness: PRIVATE DANCER
“God help us if there is a war”, my father used to say looking at Top Of The Pops on television. I could no hear him of course, as I had my fingers in my ears to protect them from the Saville peddled filth, but I could lip read and did not understand. God would indeed be helping us if there was a war, as these terrible young pop musicians might get drafted, and then killed as they would be rubbish soldiers. OK, we might lose the war, but as I have mentioned previously the single redeeming factor of the Taliban was their hatred of music*.
No many a quiet hour has been whittled away thinking of the Kaiser Chiefs as a group in World War I, stuck in a trench facing impending doom (from the English of course, the Kaiser Chief’s clearly being on Bismarck’s side). But I don’t have to imagine much, as many a pop star has had pretensions of life in the services. Take Tina Turner’s brief spell in khaki after all: Private Dancer.
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24
Apr 07
Focus Group 11 – JOJO
JOJO – “Too Little Too Late” – Score: 4.56 (10th) – Controversy: 2.40 (18th)
(Females: 12th. Males: 8th. Under 30s: 7th. Over 30s: 11th.)
Most like: Avril Lavigne. Most unlike: Maximo Park
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The Universal Declaration Of Robot Rights
Scientists are being naive in saying that the government report on granting rights to robots is a waste of time. But then scientists are always the last people to apologise when their wacky projects accidentally end up grafting intelligent robotic arms onto their back turning them into meglomaniacal villains. Its unlikely, say the scientists, that intelligence which would require any kind of rights is going to be developed in robots in the near future. And then they tell us that there is already a robotic KILLING MACHINE patrolling the North/South Korean border.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN IT GETS STRUCK BY LIGHTNING?
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Poptimism – Lesson Thirty Six
Ao Limite Eu Vou – NonStop (Misbehavin’ Rap Mix)
Me And My Imagination – Sophie Ellis-Bextor (Tony Lamezma Remix)
Super Star – S.H.E
Love Today – Mika (Rob Mello Remix)
Please – Robert Smith & Paul Hartnoll
Heart Of Gold – Boney M
Typical – Frazier Chorus
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BEAT THE BOSS
Working from home yesterday afternoon I happened to catch this FANTASTIC PROGRAMME on CBBC. Here is the premise: a group of bright kids, and a group of businessmen, compete on a new product design brief – in the episode I saw yesterday this was inventing a new kind of ice cream. The businessmen included a market researcher who I had seen speak at the industry conference about how he was down with the kids and involved celebrities like Roll Deep and Kano (and erm Ian McCulloch) in his new groovy research.
Anyway Beat The Boss does what I had thought impossible (in fact I had never thought of it at all!) – televised market research that is REALLY ENTERTAINING.
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23
Apr 07
Mile High Club Special: NO VIRGINS ON BA!
Sex in plane toilets be damned lest CSI: New York’s next Blue Ice story be turned into a rape thriller. No, no, though it really does happen occasionally. This story is about CENSORSHIP. Airlines were wary to show Airport’77, Airport’78 (the Concorde one) or even Die Hard II: Die Harder on planes, due to the sensitive plane plots in said films. However corporate espionage is another thing. British Airways, the world most headline prone airline, has taken the scissors to Casino Royale. Do they object to Daniel Craig’s blonde hair? Is it Eva Green preposterous accent? Or is it bond getting nacked in the nuts? It is none of these. Instead they have decide to exorcise RICHARD BRANSON and his VIRGIN PLANES from the film.
Now I’ll be the first film buff to admit that Richard’s hippy old face has never improved a film. But will BA continue this by snipping out Uma Thurman from any film she appears in just because she advertises Virgin TV? Actually those ads do deserve some punishment. More to the point though, Dickie Branson has been wriggling his way in to no end of films recently: all ripe for the BA Censors chop. Is there anywhere I can apply for that job?
Fat Is The New Thick
Things that struck me on reading this Observer article yesterday:
- Businessman hired to be hard-nosed and callous on TV lives up to stereotype shocker! (I am not sure how good the “It’s his job to be a knob” argument actually is, but it tends to stop me getting too exercised over these kind of ‘outbursts’)
- OK the stereotype that fat people are lazier than thin people is k-stupid BUT I can’t actually talk, it’s certainly true of me.
- Anyway won’t the invisible fat hand of the market prove or disprove Mr Dragon’s theory as his rivals hire the talented fattXoRs and gain the fruits of their labours?
- Haha the main obesity lobby organisation is called TOAST!
- Erm hold on isn’t saying “If you are obese you have a self-esteem problem” just as stereotyped and probably MORE harmful than saying “If you are obese you are lazy”?
- OMG how bad an idea is calling your pressure group that?
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