Weaver Archive

Sunday August 11

An odd episode of DARIA. Not only does our heroine have a boyfriend this series, but she's flirting with such Quinnish things as anniversaries. And guilt about being so shallow as to take hints on what to do from *her sister* of all people. Ugh. What a thought, taking ideas from the sis. Thankfully, the plot about Jake getting a job at a dotcom is acutely observed - what does this company do? And can anyone explain it in common-or-garden English? Thought not. Of course, between the commission of this epi and its airing here, about two years have elapsed, and the dotcom boom is just a distant memory, soundtracked by Sarah MacLachlan's live album.

An old idea brought back to life: next weekend will see the first in an occasional series of mailings from this site. Updates, thoughts, and a bit of gossip for my frequent viewers. Sign up here or at the permalink on the front page.

Saturday August 10

Would it be the Friday Five? Is it assuming that we all drive? I think it would, you know. Bloody United Stations, incapable of running decent mass transport.

Milk Wars - Channel 4's second programme about jawdroppingly daft people in a week. Telling the tale of David Hanley, the loudmouthed bigoted farmer from North Wales who held the country to ransom in September 2000. The tale starts in autumn 99, with moans about milk farmers not making enough money to make a decent profit. It escalates into city blockades, demonstrations at milk factories, and ultimately *that* blockade of petrol refineries that prompted panic buying and a week of total chaos that almost (but not quite) knocked the final of BIG BROTHER 1 from the front pages.

How are these people clueless? They see conspiracy in the "National Farmer's Union", a group that actually represents a few dozen large farmers. They see foolishness and failed policies in the national government. Both of these are accurate observations, but becoming the lead representative and changing the pushers of power won't make the required changes. For that, Europe's insanely corrupt and costly "Common Agricultural Policy" would need to be abolished. This move would benefit struggling farmers - they would be able to sell into a true market, and if they couldn't make a profit, that's their problem. Not the dairies, not the governments, theirs.

No one mentions the European dimension at all in the 90 minute documentary.

Friday August 9

Will Smith Enrages Florida Residents. Apparently, the piss-poor singer-slash-actor has paid USD 500,000 (ECU 500,000) to close a major road for a week and shoot a movie there. This hasn't annoyed the countless citizens of Florida as much as the point that it's Will Smith, and that's plenty annoying to begin with.

Time to throw out some European sounds that have been floating my boat lately. Nightwish is a Finnish metal band with an almost operatic singer. They add a certain something to Iron Maiden's Over The Hills And Far Away, such as lyrics one can understand...

Moonlight Coverage has covered Moonlight Shadow, Mike Oldfield's tribute to John Lennin. File under "less twee than the original."

Lemon Tree was a minor hit here in 1996, but this acoustic story remains an overlooked classic.

And David Charvet's Jusqu'au bout needs no further explanation, other than it's got a good beat.

Also... potty SCIFI channel presenter David Icke likes Yog's new single. We said he was potty ... Chris De Bleeeurgh's ditty "Lady In Red" has been voted song the most likely to make wedding guests hurl. Or, in my case, make excuses to adjust my tie ... And that new Sugababes single? Yes, it *is*, Jae.

Who has more fun in their pop treehouse than we do? Nobody!

Thursday August 8

A chum informs me that there's a new mural on the travelator between the Waterloo & City line and the Central line at Bonk underground station. It gives the nicknames of 50 of the United States, interspersed with tributes to the high quality service provided by Hammingican Hairlines. The mural is finished, but the travelator always comes to a grinding halt just when you need it most.

Secret polling by The Party has produced some unexpected results. All senior Tory politicians, and Iain Duncan Cough, are more unpopular than the euro. But United States Antipresident George W Bush Jr III is even more unpopular than the Tories. This, over and above hard-headed concern that the Connecticut dunderhead advocates leading his nation into a destructive quagmire, looks set to shape Britain's opposition to the campaign.

By adding disclaimers to emails your company conveys a professional, trustworthy image. Apart from deterring any possible adversaries from suing, it will convey awareness and professionalism to your customers.

Er, really? Your company is asking me to read people's mind - I have no idea who the intended recipient is if it's not me. Your company is trying to bind me to a contract I've not signed - redistribution is prohibited doesn't work. *And* you're asking me to hold (at least) three contradictory positions at once - if you're not the intended recipient ... take no action ... inform us directly. And you want me to do impossible things - delete all copies would ask me to visit all of the servers that routed this mail and delete the message from them, something neither of us has the power to do.

No, the regular daft email disclaimer doesn't convey a professional image. It conveys one where the legal spods and people in charge just don't understand email, and a company that perhaps I'm best off not dealing with. It doesn't so much convey awareness as raise a smirk at how utterly clueless the company really is.

If you really, really, *really* must attempt to disclaim responsibility, even though you can't, perhaps put the disclaimer on a webpage, and link to that URL. And *keep archives* for as long as is needed, so that people can find your previous policy.

A lot of people from Australia searching my site for info on TEST THE NATION, the nationally televised test of how well one does on nationally televised tests. Their equivalent aired last weekend. And I wouldn't have spotted this if it wasn't for referrer logs.

Also a search for enrique Iglesias penis size. 18mm.

A stationary store in Noi Joiysey. A lady asks the cashier: "The pen in this package I'm about to buy, does it have black ink or blue ink?"
Cashier: "I don't know."
Lady: "Any way to tell?"
Cashier: "No."
Lady: "Because I only want black ink. If it's blue, I don't want it."
Cashier: "Can't help you." Then: "Anything else I can do for you?"

TEEN SPECIES on the joy of sex. We have the lasses who know about cock rings and how they're meant to work (but don't always.) The model who looks exactly like Alex Big Brother and has almost as many girlies. The lads who got away with it, and the lass who didn't. And the annoyingly smirksome chap who was convinced that he was going to have it away on his anniversary; very smirksome, very gleeful, and (of course) they didn't. No real discussion of why, just of what happens before and after.

Wednesday August 7

Hmmmmm. The David Beckham superfan on tonight's SWAPHEADS was clearly seen with a poster for Luhrmann's ROMEO + JULIET on her bedroom wall. Bit of a fly-by-nighter? I'm seriously toning down the adulation for this show, and the review's not even pressed yet.

Meanwhile, Monday's winner, Birtney's Pears, is on the verge of quitting music, according to all gossip columnists everywhere. Will the same fate befall space travel? And can Kylie please win on Friday? Ta. Even worse, the betitted one was at a Playbeing party where Leonardo diCaprio and Tobey Maguire had "the pick of the place." Neither showed much interest in Miss Red Catsuit, though diCaptionContest did show an interest in the mystery brunette who has been seen a lot with GaGaGaGareth Gates in recent weeks.

Meanwhile, reports on LIQUID NEWS suggest GaGa is the favoured son of manager Simon Cowell. Even though Will Young beat him in the POP IDLE vote last February, it's the Bradford lad who is being heavily promoted in the States. We didn't call him "The Anointed One" for nothing, you know...

Over in the Daily Cheapshot, Duncan from Blue is dating Martine McCutcheon. Former Bluebird McTruncheonmeat is, apparently, a swift replacement for BB3 winner Kate Flawless who was told to ditch the pop stud last weekend. Odds on him being as queer as a four bob note, anyone?

Tuesday August 6

It'll be the Monday Mission, sir.

1. Ever considered just deleting your Blog and not doing it anymore? What prompted that and what stopped you?
Thought about ditching it in autumn 2000, when it began to get in the way of other things. In the event, I just scaled back on the blog until this year, cut back elsewhere, and it was worth it.

2. How about a quick review of the last movie you saw?
Crazy/Beautiful starring Kirsten as a bad girl who doesn't actually do anything bad on camera.

3. What's your favorite gadget? Are you lusting for any new ones? Will you ever be satisified???
Fave gadget (as in most used) would be either the pocket radio or the umbrella. I'd like a personal video recorder, an integrated hifi that works, a digital radio receiver independent of my PC, a GPS system, and a private jet.

4. Saturday night I played "UNO" for the first time in years, I mean it has been over 10 years since I played it. It was great fun, but it really made me want to learn how to play Backgammon again. What "table game" do you enjoy playing most with other people? Have you played it lately?
Really enjoy playing Uno, and in the right company strip Uno. Played one of those versions with Ulrike in March. Decent at backgammon, enjoyed the Game of Life board game.

5. About a year ago I was obsessed with losing weight, and I dropped pretty low before I got a handle on things (I've actually gained about 8 pounds of it back, and it is still a struggle sometimes to not try to lose it). Thankfully, I like fattening sweets and buttery popcorn too much to live like that for too long. Have you ever been obsessed with something so much that it was close to causing you physical or mental harm? If not, have you known anyone else who has?
Er, yes. I've major issues around food, enough (if one is so inclined) to deem it a mild psychological disorder. And where there's a problem, there's a solution. At least one that does the goods for me.

6. Did you grow up in a family or community that displayed racist or prejudice attitudes? Did it influence you in any way, either toward or away from those views? How did you manage to avoid it, or did you?
Thankfully, no. There weren't many non-white people around back when, there was no overt racism, and though my grandparents made the occasional off-colour comment, they were old.

7. Good grief, I am starving! You got anything to eat around here?
Pasta, packet, milk, stove, yummy snack.

This week's Comment Question: What browser and version number are you using?
Mozilla 1.0. This site is designed for Moz1. If you're using Internet Explorer, think again.

"The other athletes are scattered around the track, like so much discarded litter" - John Rawling on Paula Radcliffe's world record for the 10,000m. (We don't count the drugged Chinese in 1993. They cheated.)

Monday August 5

Today's Daily Cheapshot reports that Sara C*x is "somewhat subdued as she faces the worst professional crisis of her career." And we thought that fronting three seasons of the terminally rubbish GIRLIE SHOW was bad enough, but when we heard her replace Zoe Ball on Radio 1, and thought "What's Wogan like these days," we knew she was in deep trouble.

According to the Cheapshot, "her once brilliantly successful Radio 1 breakfast show is in a state of alarming decline." That's "brilliantly successful" in the sense of "no one has ever had a good word to say about her in the two and a half years she's been fronting the carpfest."

We hear that "fans are tiring of the Bolton-born beauty's brand of near-the-knuckle chatter." Well, yes, and are tiring of the incomprehensible gibberish that she spouts for far too much of what is supposed to be a music led show.

C*x is quoted as burbling "People might forget that I have the biggest morning show for the youth audience in the country and that's something I'm very proud of." Ah, but when was the last time C*x broke a major act through the force of her personality alone? Wogan (and his producer Paul "Dr Wally" Walters) can take a huge lump of the recent success of Eva Cassidy. C*x has given the world - er - a headache.

Record of the week is from a friend of the husband of someone mentioned above.

Time to review a few fun search terms that have led here: