Found this over at Stupid Evil Bastards site
Found this at Stupid Evil Bastard's Site

Screw you, America

Sometimes the fish in the barrel deserve to die

B Y C L I F G A R B O D E N

America speaks with one voice. Unfortunately, it emanates from its ass.
--Barry Crimmins
November 17, 2004
N E W S F E A T U R E
Don't forgive my anger. All this needs to be said. And I know that as soon as that stiff-faced to-the-manure-born right-wing lackey in the White House tries to appoint a 21st-century counterpart to Roy Bean to the Supreme Court in a few weeks, more people are going to wish they'd said it sooner. John Kerry fucked up. More important, America fucked up. And the people who fucked up the most--you infamous red-staters--are going to suffer along with the rest of us. To put it in lingo a NASCAR devotee would understand, "Y'all deserve a good talkin'-to." John F. Kerry, you're first.
In your befuddling concession speech, you actually called for unity and healing. Sounds good, clown, but can't you even imagine for a second that the people who supported you so zealously for the past five months might just see that insincere gesture of good sportsmanship as a betrayal? See, unlike you pols, we voters actually believe in shit. We believe that George W. Bush and his henchpeople are a real threat to the survival of democracy. We believe that they're killing people for profit. And we believe that they don't have a goddamn clue about forfending terrorism on U.S. soil.
That's not a position gap; that's an ideological gash. And it's not going to heal, because, unlike you expedient professional truth-manipulators, I'm not prepared to meet the enemies of freedom halfway just because you lost the election. Your speechwriters might see the Bush administration's failings as nothing more than convenient fodder for your campaign blather, but the GOP junta's sins don't go away just because decrying them no longer serves your ambitions. Last week they were the imperialist pigs who misled us into war and you were the savior. Now we're the goddamn Getalong Gang?! Screw that. Fight back or shut up.
Now, the rest of you. ...
A lot of us effete Easterners want to know: What the fuck is wrong with you?! You voted against your self-interest at every turn (you dumb-asses in South Dakota deserve special credit for voting out one of the most powerful Democrats in the Senate) and re-elected an ignorant cowboy who can't be trusted to remember a lunch order, never mind run a country. What in the name of God...?! Wait, it was in the name of God, wasn't it? Rendered weak and ignorant by a spoon-fed climate of fear, you slack-jawed inbred flatlanders have sought refuge in the traditional twin towers of mindlessness--jingoistic patriotism and fundamentalist religion. God's on your side. Like hell. Jesus loves us, dammit.
Okay, you want God? Let's talk about God. Your religion is bogus. Fundamentalism, the facile belief in the unexplained and un-researched, is something you born-agains (couldn't get it right the first time, huh?) share with Al Qaeda, whose ideologues doggedly adhere to religious misinterpretations every bit as silly and dangerous as yours. Just like you, Muslim fundamentalists long to impose an unrealistic and intolerant pseudo-Calvinist morality on the world. In fact, America's religious right has so much in common with the Shiah, it's a wonder you guys don't invite them to join the Rotary. Born-againsters look for the face of Christ in the wallpaper; fundamentalist Muslims hallucinate the voice of the 12th Imam; but aside from that (and extremely divergent attitudes toward pork), you both hate the same stuff--homosexuality, pacifism, Jews, education, uppity women, enlightenment, short skirts, gangsta rap, tattoos, infidels. ... (They also share your love of super-lethal weaponry.)
Well, sorry to burst your holy bubble, Jesus freaks, but God did not create the world in seven days; that's just ignorant. Like a lot of stuff in the Bible, it didn't happen. And Moses looked more like Jeff Goldblum than like Charlton Heston. Jesus didn't hunt; he fished. Jesus wouldn't want you (or anyone else) to have an assault rifle. What would Jesus do if he met you? He'd ask you to stop ruining his hard-won good reputation. (Y'know the guy died to redeem your sorry ass; you might at least show a little respect for what he was really about.)
What else is bothering you self-destructive morons? What other overwhelmingly urgent issue caused you to vote yourselves into the retirement poorhouse and sacrifice the four freedoms? Gay marriage? Dig it. Right at this moment in your little picturesque insular East Silage-for-Brains, U.S.A., there are gay and lesbian couples walking around--possibly even copulating. Really. It's been going on around you all your lives, and you've never been hurt by it. Now, if these same couples were "married" in any legal sense, they'd still walk and copulate as usual and it still wouldn't make any difference to you. You don't like or understand homosexuality? Fine. Nobody's asking your permission. But it's not your problem. And hiding it won't make it go away. Nor will persecuting gays change anybody's sexual preference. So, to put it aptly, go fuck yourselves and leave other people alone.
Anything else? Education deform ... er, reform. Some of you weren't even born the first time when, in 1968, legendary secular-humanist prophet Frank Zappa wrote: "All your children are poor unfortunate victims of lies you believe. A plague upon your ignorance that keeps the young from the truth they deserve." We repeat, creationism is absurd. Yet in the name of protecting this ridiculous and irrelevant belief, you toothless crank-heads are willing to eschew all science and learning this side of Copernicus. (Or do you still think the sun orbits the earth?) The Bushies really are on your side here. Leaders like G.W. and (yes, it's a fair comparison) Hitler rise to power by exploiting the support of the weak and stupid, so it's in their interest to encourage weakness and stupidity. That's where universal education becomes a threat. Education encourages creative thought. Creative thought empowers people. Fascists hate creative thought. So it's incredibly convenient for the GOP that you folks actually want your kids to be dumb. Which is why the No Child Left Behind initiative you endorse has, in fact, done nothing! Happy? Perhaps ignorance really is bliss.
What else is on your hate-laden Limbaugh-laid table? Flag burning? It's just cloth, guys. Sex ed? Heaven forbid your daughters learned the facts of life in time to prevent having to avoid an abortion.
Gun control? We said "control," not confiscation. And there are high-powered automatic weapons most civilians really do not need. Even moose tend to come at you one at a time. "But shooting's fun!" you argue. "It's a sport." Breaking windows and driving 100 miles an hour are fun, but they're legally controlled activities. "But," you object, "how do I defend my family when the nigras and the Jews and the Communists from Harvard come on my property?" Right. Lock the gate; everybody covets your Tupperware and your chard. We'll be right over.
Does it really bother you cornpone chuckleheads that "we" think you're under-educated, culturally limited and ignorant? Well, how about proving us wrong? For starters, get this straight: There were no weapons of mass destruction; the Iraqis did not attack the World Trade Center; lots of children (including many of yours) are left behind every day; the greenhouse effect is for real; and the Dixie Chicks were right. Pin down a few of those basics and then perhaps we'll talk.
Am I being elitist here? Disrespectful of the dignity of the masses? I fuckin' hope so, because 51 percent of the masses have had their say and it doesn't make sense. Besides, when I think about people being tortured while they're held without representation at Guantnamo and Iraqi families crawling out of the rubble of their own homes, I'm not too worried if I insult some Bible-sucking insurance salesman or a possum-breathed saw sharpener.
Too harsh? I know (because I've been so chided) that there are lots of good, right-thinking/left-leaning liberals out there who feel it's my responsibility to "understand" you. These are good people; unlike you assholes, they voted the right way. But this is why in true progressive circles the word liberal attracts adjectives such as "wishy-washy," "self-serving" and "useless."
In its own well-intentioned way, liberalism is, when you think about it, almost as big a problem as fundamentalism is. See, as much as I disagree with you and am disgusted by the shallow and pathetic pawns you've become, I respect your potential. That's why liberal Democrats can't bring themselves to do what the Republicans do so well -- cynically lie to you for selfish gain. (Do you really think Kerry would have banned the Bible?) We nice people actually expected reasoned arguments, logic and incontrovertible evidence to convince you that Kerry was the better candidate. Turns out that the GOP's double whammy of fear and loathing is a more powerful vote-getting tool.
Of course they, not we, laid the groundwork there. And that's the real shocker you fly-over chicken-rubbers are going to realize just before the end (of freedom, that is; I don't mean the Rapture, which is something else you believe in that's not going to happen): You've been duped, and the Bushies are laughing at you behind your spineless backs right now. The Republicans don't care about you; they just wanted your vote so they can stay in power and make their oil-and-blood-soaked cronies even richer. They're going to send your job overseas and destroy Social Security. In the name of catching terrorists, they're going to make sure you don't read any interesting books or travel without permission. They're going to toss you a minuscule tax cut in exchange for under-funding public education and social services, so there will be more poor people around to bother you. Perhaps you will become one of them.
They're going to shower the pharmaceutical companies with excess profits while denying you life-saving medical attention. They're going to let corporate conglomerates fill the air you breathe with carcinogens while they discourage clean-energy research. They're going to insist the ozone layer's OK until y'all bake your little red asses off. They're going to alienate the rest of the Western world and any portion of the Eastern world that isn't willing to supply Wal-Mart with cheap labor. They're going to throw more Saddam-esque bogeymen in your face while tacitly supporting Saudi terrorists and ignoring nuclear-armed Korean dictators. They're going to rig the system so that even you law-abiding yahoos won't be able to get a fair trial. And worst of all, they're going to dehumanize your children and send them off to kill or be killed in the name of oil profits.
And you bought into it all because you're afraid. And you're afraid because they scared you. And it was all so unnecessary. You don't have to be frightened. You (okay, most of you) aren't really stupid or helpless. I know you at your worst and best. I grew up with you; I shared outdoor plumbing with you; I complimented the dead deer hanging on your front porches. You can open your minds and accept or reject things on their merits instead of on their reputations in small-minded circles. You can think for yourselves.
And some day, you might figure that out. Meanwhile, you deserve what we all got thanks to you, you bastards.
Clif Garboden is senior managing editor of The Boston Phoenix and president of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies. He can be reached at cgarboden@phx.com .

- posted by Buntifer @ 1/27/2005 10:37:00 am

 
I'm back in the country baby!
I put a quiz here originally, but the text was all in black, and i couldn't find the html code to change it, so it was illegible, and the picture was all screwy - so no go. Safe to say I am the same as the brunette in general, with slightly higher and lower scores on various counts.

Right, well since that didn't work, I shall entertain in another way, an older and more established way, that takes a bit more hard work. I shall find something in my head, beat it inot submission, drag it out of my nasal cavity in a similar procedure to the ancient egyptians mummification procedure and slap it down onto the keyboard until it produces a the semblance of words/thoughts etc.

Well bugger me it's cold in England. It was cold in Dubai, but not this damn cold. It rained too - so my weather.what to pack advisor at work has been fired for telling me to take t-shirts only. I was sodding freezing, and I tell you, if I had been any type of male metallic simian, I would now be a neuter metallic simian.

However, the show went well, and we have invitations ot return, either with or without shows in the future, which is nice.

I have to go now - as my boss has returned. Suffice to say that Tescos may be a premier supermarket, but by god their Broadband advisors leave something to be required. They would be better off with simians.

Toodles.
- posted by Buntifer @ 1/25/2005 08:50:00 am

 
A Slight Hiccup
Our first performance is in Abu Dhabi, down in “The English Club” there. Apparently a nice little venue with 3000 members of whom around 180 had booked to see us in a venue that could seat 200.

We set off fairly early in the morning, as Abu Dhabi is about an hour and a half’s drive away from Dubai, and got there by half eleven with no problem. The set had gone ahead with a man with a van, as is so often the case.

We settled down and had a drink by the pool, as we couldn’t get into the space until 12, and when 12 came around, we wandered in for our first look at the space. Phil had described it as a “village hall that has been spoilt” in so far as they had a nice lighting rig. It was pretty close, being spoilt by the weather as well…

The tech box was fine, only I don’t know how to work this board, so I asked their technician. I had been assigned a little Indian chap as their “technician” to help me for the afternoon. He had bugger all idea what I was talking about, but smiled and turned the desk on, which was a start.

I went back downstairs and asked if they had given me the wrong guy, because this guy knew nothing about the lighting desk at all. The manager confidently assured me that this was the right guy, but that the only people who knew about the lighting desk were the drama club, who were all members, and not staff of the club. He got one on the phone for me, whom for the purposes of this narrative we shall call Simon, who told me how to call up the dimmer channels one by one and thus find out where all the lights were patched in.

I bid him goodbye and went through every single dimmer and channel. Turns out only ten of the lights are working, and they are all on the left of the auditorium.

So I checked all the connections, I double checked the dimmers and channels, and I checked the manual patching, and the dimmers. No joy. Ten lights. We can do a show on less, although it would have been nice to have some on the right hand side of the auditorium as well, but never mind.

I called Simon again, who told me they had all been working the week before, gave me another couple of places to check, and then couldn’t help me any more. The manager offers me the manual to the lighting board, but I say no, that isn’t the problem, which it wasn’t.

So fine, we will focus the lights we have, and do the show with those. We get them focused and then are kicked out so a kiddies sport group can get in. Fine. We can get back in at five.

I say “No Problem” and start drawing out my plans, and making sure I have noted which channels do which as I will need to shout to Phil up in the box as I look from the auditorium. We grab a bite to eat and go back for five.

The auditorium is crowded with helpers clearing the crashmats the kiddies had and putting out chairs for us.

I settle down to do the states – program them in. The board doesn’t have enough channels, and you can’t switch states to a channel, but I have doubled a state and cut one, and we are fine.

But I have to delete the states that are already in there. I can do that on most of them, and do so with no problem, but there is a chase, and try as I might I can’t find out how to get rid.

I hasten to add now that I have looked at the patching for the board, and it looks hard patched to me.

I find an option to “wipe all” Y/N

Those of you who know what a DMX channel is may well be groaning to yourselves. I didn’t know until yesterday, and I’m still a bit hazy to tell you the truth.

I pressed yes, thinking, “great, this will clear all the states in the board.

It also cleared all the patches in the board, and the DMX channels or curves, or whatever the fuck they are. So now, when I press “dimmer 1, channel 1” expecting one of our Hard patched lights to come on it doesn’t. Five thirty – performance at nine.

Oh bugger.

I look frantically for the manual, but it isn’t in the tech box. I look frantically for the reload disk, but that isn’t in the tech box either. I restart the board two or three times in the hope that I might just have induced a temporary amnesia into its circuits. No such luck.

I grab the Indian technician, and ask for the manual. He looks in the tech box despite me telling him that the damn thing isn’t there. I ask for the reload disk, he looks in the tech box despite my best efforts. He then asked what the problem was, and restarted the desk three or four times. Hmmm.

I went down and broke the news gently to Phil and Mark – to explain why we weren’t building the scenes if nothing else.

I got Simon on the phone again. He said we need the reload disk and that the club has three. Fine.

I ask the Indian guy who is helping me. He says the club has none, and begins searching the tech box again. So I go ask the duty manager, who starts phoning the am dram guys who usually use it. No luck.

The Indian guy turns up a phone number of a guy who supposedly has the disk, but no answer. Six oclock, performance at nine.

I call Simon back, explain that they can’t find the disk and ask if there are any other solutions. He says “find the manual, look at the section on patching, it will tell you how to do it and it can be done in ten minutes.

I ask the Indian guy who is helping me out. He says the club has none, and begins searching the tech box again. I point out that the manager offered me one earlier, but he finds out that the manager is in a meeting, and noone else knows where it is. He claims it doesn’t exists personally.

Sop I find the duty manager, who also know absolutely dick all about any lighting manuals.

The Indian chap has found the guy who he was trying to ring, he is on club premises. He comes up to me, says “follow” and runs off. So we run past the pool, past the bar, past the snooker room, past the beach, past the squash courts and into the gym. Where my guide barges upstairs and finally finds some chap doing sit ups. We interrupt his workout to ask about the board. He has a manual at home, but it would take him an hour to get there and back, he has never seen a disk, and suggests downloading the manual.

So I go back to the theatre, and commandeer a computer from the duty manager to get a manual on. I find the site of the manufacturers (Avolites) and their downloads page is blocked because of something or other. I find some unofficial pages and they are blocked as well. Despite being close to tears I go back and tell Phil and Mark the bad news. I’m stumped.

Seven O’Clock. Have a cigarette. Stare bleakly at house lights hoping they will give enough cover. Consider using a follow spot for the whole show. Have another cigarette. Consider bar as a likely means of escape.

Someone has found the manual online. It isn’t the right manual, as I find out when I go to look at this modern miracle, but it will do. Meanwhile the Avolites regional office has been called and they have sent out their head technician, who should be here in twenty minutes. The dude doing sit ups has also agreed to go home and get his manual.

Seven thirty – We are informed that we MUST open the doors at 8:40 very latest. Nothing has arrived yet. The manual is downloading. My Indian buddy shows me another lighting board that they use for outdoors, but that is no help.

Seven fifty and too many cigarettes later, we have enough of the manual to get started.

Turns out the fucking thing only takes five minutes once you have the manual.

Eight O’Clock. I am half way through a pretty sketchy stage focus, when the Avolite technicians turn up. Sorry boys, we are already fixed. But they stay there till I’m done. The old guy has been phoned.

Ten past eight. The manager of the club walks out of his meeting – “the manual? It’s in this cupboard!” he says.

Anyway. We got it done, and they seemed to like it. No harm done.

P.S Note to the brunette when you pick me up from the airport – I’m the one with the grey hair…


The days afterwards – we had a nice leisurely tech in Dubai – with technicians who knew what they were doing. Phil is doing a short play before Anorak, to fill some time and make it into a full evening of entertainment…turns out the pile of junk the houseboy disposed of this morning were the props for that show, plus the air tickets for the next act who is coming out, and the soundtrack.

A calm and considered response was, “I’m going to fucking kill him” which cropped up more than once over the course of climbing into a metal cleanaway bin to retrieve the aforesaid props. Some have gone for good though.

- posted by Buntifer @ 1/18/2005 06:57:00 am

 
Dubai: First Impressions
The plane journey was fun, I haven’t been on a plane for ever so long, so it was pleasant to find that they haven’t changed too much, other than the addition of mini plasma screen for each seat, so one may enjoy ones own movie, although, unless one is in first class, the timing is fixed.

We had a supper which was better than the airline food I remember, and settled down to watch films. The choice was not what I had remembered, other than the fact that there were four to choose from, but these four were “Ladies in Lavender”, “Collateral”, “Wimbledon” and “The Bourne Supremacy” I plumped for the Bourne Supremacy, which it turned out was not showing, so I tuned into Collateral ten minutes late. It was not very good. Aah well, never mind.

Very little, if any sleep was got, as we both had extra wine after supper, and then, since my headphones were broken, I made a quick detour to the back of the plane to get some new ones, at which point the stewardess enquired as to whether we fancied any extra drinks, so I asked for a G&T for myself, and one for Mark. She gave us four, so we were pissed by the time the films were over (We had had a few pints in the departure lounge…Wetherspoons in the departure lounge was more expansive than in London, three fifty a pint!) and it was two thirty in the morning. We landed at four thirty.

Not too hot once we landed, and the baggage came out quickly. We had had the lucky happenstance to have requested, and been given bulkhead seats, so our legs were nicely stretched already. There were medics waiting as we got off the plane, to deal with a 37 year old woman on the plane, who apparently had had a fit and had to be sedated. We didn’t see her though at any point in time

A quick sojourn to duty free, where 200 Camels (the cigarette, not the beastie, cost 44 dhareems, which is about seven quid. Nice…(Mum and Dad – obviously I didn’t buy any…)

We were met by Philippe, the producer, who looks very much like Brian Cox’s little brother (I think I mean Brian Cox – the villain from X Men 2)

We then didn’t sleep till midnight. It feels like we have been here a week, because we got so much done, tourist visiting wise, on the first day.

Dubai seems incredibly commercial. There are flags by the sides of the roads advertising shops and suchlike all the way down the main drag, which I believe is called Sheikh Zayed Road. The advertising billboards for the new developments also are the biggest I have ever seen.

So we set off in Philippe’s landrover discovery, with him pointing out landmarks. He and his family have been here for 15 years now, and he pointed to a building, a tower of commerce or something, and said, “that building was here fifteen years ago, from here on until I say ‘now’ there was nothing but desert on wither side of this road, and the road itself was a two lane badly concreted road.” He didn’t say ‘now’ for fifteen minutes of driving along what is now between six and ten lanes of massive and perfect motorway. Aside from the hard rock café, which apparently was there 15 years ago in the middle of nowhere and now has prime acreage alongside the road. There are no real rules about overtaking or lane changing in Dubai, so one simply weaves in and out of the traffic as one sees fit. It makes for an interesting ride.

I think 90% of the worlds cranes must be in Dubai- there are veritable forests of them around the place building Allah only knows what. The amount of development going on is scary, and the speed of building is only matched by the number of new developments starting each day. Almost all of them describe themselves as “going to be the worlds most prestigious square kilometer” There are huge, truly massive skyscrapers appearing everywhere, and yet there are also huge areas of tremendously squat little buildings in which people live. My sense of scale was completely warped by the end of the day, as I found myself thinking of the normal buildings as tiny compared to the developments which take over the skyline, but if you count the stories of the smaller building, it can still be five or six high, it simply looks miniscule.

One of the more ‘prestigious’ of the developments is a new mall which is still in the ‘shell’ stage, which will feature inside the foyer a full size working ski slope…with real snow! Shopping is massive here, in fact we have arrived at the beginning of one of Dubai’s big events. The Dubai shopping festival (I would link to a site, but I am typing on word and I am going to copy and paste into blogger when I am done.)

It isn’t too hot – but it is the Dubai winter, and the middle of the day in the sun is hot, but the nights are actually fairly chilly, only as chilly as your average English summers evening, but not as balmy as I had imagined. Still it is nice not to be too hot, and it is warmer than London.

We came back to the house, we are staying with the producer and his wife, who live a little out of town proper, and ditched our stuff, before venturing out. He is putting a show on before ours in Dubai, and so had a rehearsal in the morning, (we had arrived at 830 am) so we went a had a look at the theatre, which looks incredibly well equipped and very new, in the Madinat, which is the picture I posted before. We wandered around it, it is designed as a souk, where one is supposed to get lost, and it worked very well, as we got lost and wandered nicely, poking through the shops there, although we were advised not to buy anything as that area is very touristy and the things in there can be got much much cheaper elsewhere – but exactly the same.

Excuse the fractured narrative, we are going out again in 20 minutes so I am typing this fast from my notes. We went to a more downmarket part of town, where the shopping is good and cheap, and Mark bought himself a mosque alarm clock, which Allah U Akbars at you until you wake up. It cost about 70p. I bought a fancy knife, which is beautiful, which cost around a tenner. I saw a wonderful gramophone, with a brass trumpet, just like the brunette wants, but I don’t know that I can fit it into my case on the way back, what with the trumpet and all…We had a sharma, which was a mini chicken kebab, nice and handheld, and just nice to plug a gap before dinner.

We might get to visit the Berj Al Arab, reportedly the only 7 star hotel in the world (you get your own butler, rooms start at 500 quid a night) which apparently costs 60 quid just to enter, redeemable against the cost of your bill obviously… Philippe knows someone inside who might get us in for free…

We then came back to the house for a beer and a quick rest before popping up the the Jebel Ali Club, which seems frequented by the ex-pats who reside in this part of town, the jebel Ali village. Inside it could be a bar in London, but outside there is a pool and a gym, and a small cheesy jazz club. We had a nice dinner outside on the veranda, I tried Chicken Makhni, which I have never heard of before, and Philippe and his wife had never tried either, before moving rooms to the smoking patio where we had an apple shisha, a great experience that I have only had before in the cellar of the union before the Messiah – which was nice. The apple tobacco is sticky with apple syrup, and the taste is sweet. It doesn’t really feel like smoking, as most of the nicotine and grot is taken out by the water. Imagine a really large and ornate bong, and one has almost the right idea of what a shisha is – again I would link if I had time-

Then back to bed, the brunetter woke me up on the phone halfway through (honestly!) – sleep after a 42 hour awake cycle. Twelve hours sleep later we have had breakfast and are off again.

In other news: Our Wednesday performance has been cancelled because Eid falls on that day, so no entertainment after 6pm

They have all of our shops out here, including Next, Debenhams, Starbucks (obviously) and my favourite, the supermarket “Safestways” which is obviously much safer then our humble version.

More updates when I get the chance.

- posted by Buntifer @ 1/14/2005 01:30:00 pm

 
And so it begins...
first blog and I haven't even left yet. I hope that the travel arrangements don't keep going this way...the tube isn't running to Terminal Four - so I have t go to Terminal 3 and wlk accoring to the unhelpful/grumpy/premenstrual lady on the telephone this morning. now this would be ok aside from the following:

1: It is cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey* out there, and I am not wearing a big coat cos I don't want to take a massive coat to Dubai

2: I have a fucking suitcase to carry

Now there are probably ways to get twixt Term 3 and Term 4 w/o walking...but still. i found this on http://london-underground.blogspot.com/ and thought I should post it for all you commuters out there.

Underground Song

Molto funny.

Anyway. I think I am packed, and have been killing time by watching the Sin City Trailer over and over again.

Oh.My.God. How fucking cool does it look? [rhetorical]

I found the best comment about it on the Night Warrior message boards - "It makes me horny." I think that sums it up - not just for the girls, but just for that amount of "cool" crammed in to those forty seconds.

In other news I finished my Night Warrior short and have started something a little longer. If either of you haven't checked out the website yet, do so...NOW

Right, back to check my packing for the 23541th time...

Can anyone else think of something I have forgotten?

*Brass Monkey: The phrase brass monkey comes from the nautical days of yore when cannons were used on ships. The cannon balls for these cannons had to be stored somehow, in fairly large quantities near the guns themselves as the balls could weight a hell of a lot. Now the best way to store spheres is in a pyramid, nine on the base, four on top of those and one on top of those. That way you could keep 14 cannon balls next to a cannon.

If you do this on the floor though, the balls will go everywhere, so they created plates of metsl with nine dimples in which the bottom nine balls would sit. These plates could not be made of iron, for even one or two days in salty sea weather was enough to rust the iron, so they were made of brass.

When metal gets cold it contracts, and the rate at which it contracts is different for different metals. When it became very cold on board ship, the monkeys would contract, squeezing the balls out of place, and when one ball goes, they all go.

Hence the phrase: "Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey."

Nothing about spayed metal monkeys after all then...
- posted by Buntifer @ 1/12/2005 11:43:00 am

 
Dubya...I mean Dubai
Dubai is the quintessential home of sand, sun and shopping. A century ago, it was a tranquil town whose coral-and-gypsum huts housed Bedouin traders and pearl divers. Today the merchants have gone international and science-fiction skyscrapers stand alongside the mosques and wind towers of Old Dubai.

Dubai is really two towns merged into one and divided by Dubai Creek (Khor Dubai), an inlet of the Gulf. Deira lies to the north and Bur Dubai to the south. Both districts are home to traditional architecture and bustling souqs, but the old city centre is in Deira. Glittering new office buildings along Sheikh Zayed Rd (known as Trade Centre Rd) in Bur Dubai threaten to supplant it as the city's real centre of gravity.

The focal point of Deira's hustle and bustle is on Baniyas Rd, which runs along Dubai Creek; Baniyas Square, which used to be called Al-Nasr Square and is still generally referred to as such; Al-Maktoum Rd and Al-Maktoum Hospital Rd; and Naif Rd. On the Bur Dubai side, the old souq area runs from Al-Ghubaiba Rd to the Diwan (Ruler's Office) and inland as far as Khalid bin al-Waleed Rd.

There aren't really any street addresses in Dubai. People refer to the main roads by name, but the smaller, numbered streets remain largely anonymous. If someone offers you directions like 'It's in the white villa, next to the big tree, across from the Avari Hotel,' don't fret. Your taxi driver will know the way.

Thanks to the LonelyPlanet Guide to Dubai for the text i pinched above. I don't know anything about the place.

And I am going to do this:


ANORAK OF FIRE - at the Madinat Theatre

Direct from a critically acclaimed appearance on the London stage, Gus Gasgoine "The James Bond of Trainspotting" is coming to the Emirates to open up the magical world of trainspotting to a whole new generation of anorak owners. He will be performing at the Madinat Theatre on 18, 19 and 20 January 2005.

Life hasn't been easy for Gus - as the only "spotter" in his street, he was considered an extremely odd child and his love of trains has played havoc with any attempts to lose his virginity - but as a man who believes that Crewe station to a spotter is like Monte Carlo to James Bond, his enthusiasm for everything locomotive has more than compensated.

"Hilariously and harrowingly funny" The Times

Tickets are priced at AED 100 and will be available from the Madinat Theatre Box Office, Souk Madinat Jumeirah.

Date: 18, 19 and 20 January 2005

For further information, please call:
Madinat Theatre Box Office, Souk Madinat Jumeirah
Tel: +971 4 3666550

at this resort:

I had been under the impression that the theatre held 4500 people, because the only plan i could find of a performance space is that size, but it turns out they have a theatre that holds 432 instead, which is more reasonable sized, although not quite so much fun.

For the record, I don't know why Max's site has suddenly stopped working...it is asking me for a password to get into the site, which is a surefire way to drive away cutomers before you've begun. It could just be my browser (Mozilla) which does some funny things sometimes.

Anyway. I am hopefully going to be posting fairly frequently while I am Dubaing, either form where we are staying or from internet cafe's along the road. So watch this space, or the space above this when I actually start posting.

In the meantime I am skiving work today to do things like get packed and do my first blog of the trip etc etc. I am nearly packed, but I paranoid that i will forget things I should have with me etc etc. Anyway, provided I have my passport, toothbrush and wallet with me I should be safe...

In other news, I am starting to think about my first rewrite of Legionnaire now, and hopefully it should come out better, and very possibly bigger. It will have to wait for me to get back to England, but then I am still awaiting Mum's red pen and exclamations about my punctuation. I have to go now, to try and finish a script for NightWarrior before I leave the country.

Toodles then peeps.

p.s This is an add on, I just checked my site stats and one of the searches that found me was this following one: http://ixquick.com/do/metasearch.pl?cmd=process_search&language=english&rl=NONE&query=Directions for Masterbating a Girl&relsrch=1

Now I know that this is something that guys almost certainly need directions for, but I'm sure that "directions" was not the right phrase to use as was evidenced by what you find if you follow that search, which is Concepts for a Buntiful World (although maybe a sex guide is an idea) albeit it was only because I had mispelled masturbation.

For anyone's reference though, further down that search was :
http://www.healthboards.com/ubb/Forum102/HTML/000585.html

Which claims to be what whoever did that search was looking for.

Anyway. I hope they come back...



- posted by Buntifer @ 1/11/2005 02:51:00 pm

 
And a big hand for......
http://www.maxarush.com/images/large/bladfogcan.jpg


Oscar, with photography by Max.A.Rush.

Now who can honestly say they haven't wanted to look that suave? and smoking a watering can too...


- posted by Buntifer @ 1/10/2005 06:02:00 pm

 
2005: Year of the Pansy
Welcome to Concepts of a Buntiful World 2005. Brand New Year: Same Old Shit

Now I imagine many of you are after more Bunt for your Buck, or more Bang for your Bunt, depending on how much Bunt you have in comparison to how many Bucks. This site endeavours to provide that oomph, the pizzazz and the bite for the Bunt that is out there, and for a reasonable amount of bucks, will provide Bunt for anyone, except the axis of evil. [Bush, Blair and Bo Selecta (note the alliteration, B is the root of all evil despite many slanders on the name of money and women)]

I have news for 2005. I spent New Years Eve in Manchester very pleasantly, very good Chinese meal, compliments to the chef.

Red Wine + Mulled Wine + Beer + Champagne = (surprisingly) No hangover = Good Result.

Pictionary = Bad Result

Went to see my Grandparents on the way back from the North, wobbly but happy.

Reclaimed computer and dvd player. Dvd player works like a charm. Computer works like a Microsoft product. bugger. Still fighting the evil forces of what might be a virus, or what might just be Microsoft being shit. Who can say, the results are so often so similar that it is difficult to tell.

Back at work = Bad result. However I am able to type this from work, and use the internet from there so it might not be all such a bad idea after all.

Brunette's computer has a virus, probably from my computer = Bad Result.

In other news, I don't know anyone who was in the Tsunami, which seems to be a relative rarity [no pun intended] and have been rather bemused by the number of new year emails I have received from people which start off: "Oh gosh it is terrible about the Tsunami, our hearts go out to all those who were caught out there ect ect. Anyway, i got sloshed on New Years Eve and had a wicked time, what a wonderful Christmas I had ect ect"

Hint: Keep the emails separate, then it looks like you really care!

Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle is shaping up to be pretty wicked, and i am looking forward to taking the third in the series to Dubai with me, where it should keep me going fairly well.

I am getting nervous about going to Dubai, which is a good sign, because my brain was having problems believing I was going up until fairly recently. I have begun to think about things to pack, and precisely how many duty free cigarettes I can pack into my case on the way home. It won't be too hot out there apparently, which is a good thing, as I sweat like a paedophile in a playground in British Sunshine, and wasn't sure I could handle the industrial strength sunshine they have out there. Still, it should be a nice temperature outside, which is all good.

My bandwidth is being eaten by a virus I think, so any ideas out there from anyone who might know more about computers than me, please feel free to offer advice. Every little helps, although I think I have covered most of the general areas of virus protection.

In other news, I can't remember if I plugged Night Warrior comic on here before, I probably have, but since my readership is so huge I shall plug it again, just to ensure that both my readers have visited www.nw-comic.co.uk and read the first two episodes of Deadly Jade.

I have some shorts written for the end of the second season, so they will be a while, but I am looking forward to seeing what an artist will do with my words, and am encouraged by what I have seen so far, although I prefer my scripts...but hey...

Ooh, and I have started readin another hideously expensive comic series which almost rival Preacher for coolnessity, which is Y: The Last Man. very cool, very frustrating, because the whole series isn't out yet so I have to wait for the books one by one...DAMNIT

Ennyway. I am going to post this, then going to go eat my lunch. Hahaha...hmm?
- posted by Buntifer @ 1/06/2005 01:51:00 pm