Strachan v Ferguson

Alex Ferguson makes me cringe every time I listen to him. 

I was virtually cowering under the sofa last night as he claimed with apparent authority that his team had qualified already for the next phase of the Champions League. They haven't. 

His mumbled, incoherent responses were suggestive of a man who really thinks he's far to important to be questioned about anything. 

On the other hand Gordon Strachan was on sparkling form. 

He was asked if it had felt like the Alamo facing wave after wave of United attacks.  He replied that, unlike John Wayne and Richard Widmark, at least Celtic had survived.

Chic Young asked him a couple of questions which Strachan rebutted prompting Chic to surmise that perhaps it wasn't his lucky night. Strachan replied that he hoped Chic got lucky later that night and suggested he attend the Grab a Granny night at a local hotel.

Let's hope the wee man never accepts a knighthood and becomes as dim-witted and laborious as his former mentor.

Elton John

According to the Sun today,

Elton John is to resign as life president of Watford "in light of developments over the past few months"

He is to resign now from a professional football club after years of drug abuse and gay sex! Having survived heart problems and Candle In The Wind he's getting the boot now!

What the sainted aunt has been up to over the past few months?

Trainspotting

In an article about Trainspotting in the Observer Film Magazine director Danny Boyle mentions the word Britain on 5 separate occasions. As opposed, I suppose, to 5 times on the same occasion. 

BritainBritainBritainBritainBritain. 

He didn't do that. But he does seem to be a bit obsessed with the old British thing. British audiences, British movies, British people, British cinema (same as movies, really), British people being unique. He's rather fond of Britain, to be sure.

But worst of all he even mentions Britpop. Which is short for British popular music but snappier. He describes Britpop as part of a "fuck this" energy which created change in, you guessed it, Britain.

Britpop, of course, did no such thing. Unless you count cosying up with Tony Blair and his ludicrous and embarrassing Cool Britannia sloganeering as a "fuck this" energy. 

Transpotting, however, is a tremendous film and stands up really well still. Boyle talks about how all the cast were great and how Ewan Mcgregor's performance created a "stillness" at the centre of the film which really allowed all the other characters to breathe.

That's all true and hats off to Boyle for creating this timeless masterpiece.

However, Trainspotting is about the least British movie I can think of.

The One Show

It's virtually impossible to avoid crap tv completely.

You can't just live on BBC4 because that way it just gets boring and you may actually die eventually.

And you can't just watch football and good stuff like Flight of the Conchords ("Flight") and The Wire ("The") cos they're simply not on all the time.

So you might read a book or go for a walk or make a curry or drink heavily but eventually ... eventually, you'll have to spend some time watching crap tv.

So when that time comes, as come it surely will, then I suggest you cram all your crap tv watching into one show. The One Show.

On this crap tv show you may find Michael Stipe sitting on the couch discussing butterflies with Giles Brandreth. You might find that interesting and clever wildlife bloke being extremely interesting and clever about some interesting (but not clever) newts. Your host Adrian Chiles will be urbane and withering and the lovely Christine Bleakly will be bidentinely charming and sexy. 

You will find everything and indeed nothing on The One Show. It will just drift by like a painted kite and you'll realise that it is unfortunately not crap tv at all. It's very good. 

So you'll have to look elsewhere for your crap tv. There's no shortage of choice.

Idiot Test

I did something bad this morning. 

But I started off by doing something good. Then, within seconds, I made it bad.  

I'm an idiot.

Here's what happened...

I was dropping the youngest off at nursery and I noticed an older kid, whom I knew, had a new matching hat, scarf and glove set.

Our kids only seem to have completely un-matching hat, scarf and glove un-sets so I found this pleasing.

So I said to her "I like your hat, scarf and gloves."

She's a nice little girl so she politely thanked me.

I should, of course, have left it there but a joke struck me and I decided to try it out on this six year old.

"Actually", I said, "I like the hat and scarf but I only like one of the gloves". 

I pointed to her left glove with a crooked finger and added, "I don't like that one".

They were all exactly the same, a lovely sort of pink tartan effect. It was preposterous that I would have taken agin the left glove.

She looked at me and then burst out crying. Before I could explain the joke she was off in search off her Dad.

The whole set was exactly the same. You see?

Clarkson

Oh this has gone too far! 

Why are people so easily offended? Jeremy is just being Jeremy.  

When he describes a truck drivers' typical day as,

"Change gear, change gear, check mirror, murder a prostitute, change gear, change gear, murder prostitute"

...he's simply being Jeremy. That's why people love him, isn't it?

Clarkson, ahead of the curve as usual, was merely firing his razor-sharp pomposity pistol at all you idiots who are continually perpetrating this unfair urban myth. 

"Won't you stop already with the truck-driver/prostitute thing!!!", our hero is saying when he brings it up casually on his tv programme.

And even if truck drivers do in fact kill prostitutes on a daily basis, if anything it only shows just how bloody difficult it is to drive a truck. Work is hard enough already.

So what's the problem?

Carl Linnaeus, Botanist

Whilst in a waiting room this morning - waiting - I picked up a copy of National Geographic. Browsing therein, I was struck by an article on Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus. 

Linnaeus, like most people in Sweden, was interested in the sexual parts of flowers. The stamens and the pistils, if you will.

But not only was he interested in the sexual life of flowers he also attempted to compare these with the complicated human relationships of those around him in the small eighteenth century Swedish hamlet in which he lived.

Yes he did!

Thus, he described the Fuchsia as,

Eight men in the same bridal suite with one woman

The Gentian Sage (pictured) as,

Two men in the same marriage

Not clear here if Linnaeus envisioned any female involvement here at all! Complicated relationships indeed. I read on...

Of the Dahlia he commented,

The men have created a union with their sexual organs

The Common Comfrey reminded him of,

One woman, one man, straight but with blood-spitting

The Cockspur Coral Tree was a bit like,

Nine men bundled around one woman. Another woman watches

The Delta Maidenhair Fern positively reeked of,

The joy of the hidden marriage

And the Wax Plant was redolant of,

A gentleman farmer smoking patiently in bed awaiting his flame-haired mistress

Okay, I made that last one up but the rest is all true. You must believe me!

There was more, much more but I was jolted from my sexy plant reverie, and back into the real world of a waiting room, when someone said my name. It was Dr Fischer, my plastic surgeon.

I was up. My wait was over. I was relieved and disappointed in equal measure.

Mercury Rev

Saturday afternoon, lying on the sofa with my three year old daughter.

She watching Charlie and Lola. Me listening to Mercury Rev on the wireless headphones.

All well in the world.

But then she decided she'd like a listen. So I gave her the headphones.

After a few minutes I asked for them back but she refused. Ten minutes later she's thoroughly entranced by this strange, beautiful, psychedelic folk-rock. Refusing to give me the headphones back. 

So, we're still on the Saturday afternoon sofa but all is changed....

Me now watching Charlie and Lola. She listening to Mercury Rev on the wireless headphones.

Fate Deals Me Blow After Blow.

I wouldn't mind so much but I Will Not Ever Never Forget You Nibbles is not quite really my favourite episode.

ELO

I've had ELO in the car all week. 

Yes, Jeff Lynn, Bev Bevan, the whole lot of dem proggy faux-classical popsters filling up the Focus with their beardy, knob-fiddling sounds.

Thing is when they're not fiddling their knobs and twiddling with their dongles they make the most sublime, extraordinary music. Each of the songs is in equal parts uplifting and beautiful and annoying and irritating.

And, predictably, like the curate's egg, the bad bits make the rest of it entirely unpalatable.

Damn shame.

Snow Patrol

Panic over. Maconie has Snow Patrol as his album of the week.

And he just played Beyonce.

He's standing in on a Radio 2 morning show. He has to play soft-headed music. It's in the contract.

Phew!